BARCELONA: Thailand is an emerging market that can deploy 5G in 2020 but readiness of both government policy and carriers is a must, says Huawei Technologies.
At the Mobile World Congress' media roundtable, James Wu, president of Huawei Southeast Asia, said the government needs an appropriate policy for 5G deployment and effective spectrum usage management, while national carriers need to adjust fully to the shift in tools and cloud networks to help complement each other.
Mr Wu said Huawei is ready to provide consulting and recommendations, already proposing a digital economy white paper to the Thai government.
In Southeast Asia, developing the digital economy has become a consensus and Huawei is thrilled to see many countries in the region launching their digital economy strategies, such as Thailand 4.0 and Digital-connected Myanmar.
Wu: Appropriate state policy needed
"We believe we can help Thailand achieve its goal of a Thailand 4.0 digital economy," he said.
Challenges in reaching that goal include the lack of an ICT infrastructure, digital awareness and investment, said Mr Wu.
"The digital divide has been widening and the benefits of a digital economy have not been fully realised," he said.
Huawei is ready to accelerate 5G deployment in Southeast Asia, particularly in Thailand as the company began 5G research in Thailand in 2009 and has invested more than US$600 million (18.8 billion baht) in R&D.
"Huawei has already introduced breakthrough technology and spectrum design in the air interface," said Mr Wu.
The company plans to release a full range of commercial 5G equipment including a wireless access network, transport network and core network soon.
Huawei is working on broadening the impact of the Narrow Band Internet of Things, and forecasts 100 million connections on that platform will be created around the world by 2025, used for public utilities, transport, manufacturing, healthcare, agriculture, finance, and other sectors, driving them to go digital.
In 2018 Huawei expects to invest an additional $5 billion in 5G R&D, Mr Wu said.
"5G technology will not replace 4G immediately, but it will coexist and supplement 4G," he said. Large-scale 5G should greatly enhance mobile broadband capabilities, said Mr Wu.
He believes South Korea will implement large-scale pre-commercial launches before 2020, while China, Japan and Europe will do small-scale 5G deployments next year. Real global deployment of 5G is likely to take place in 2020, said Mr Wu.
"If we are looking at Asian countries, Hong Kong, Thailand and India are projected to be the initial leaders of 5G deployment," he said.
