Vodafone announced it is testing the fifth generation mobile telecoms network, which will significantly increase the speed of Internet connection in seven major British cities by the end of 2018. Aiming at demonstrating the results of its trial, Vodafone provided a live holographic show featuring Manchester City and England Women’s football captain Steph Houghton, in Newbury, near London.
The shows featured the player interacting with Vodafone's Anne Sheehan and Iris, an 11-year-old Man City fan. During the holographic presentation, the participants had the impression that they were in the same room.
The third and fourth generations telecoms networks do not provide such holographic displays that require high transmission speeds for huge amounts of data and images. According to tests conducted by the chip maker Qualcomm, the 5G network is about 8 times faster than the 4G network.
The company used AR Hololens glasses, which was used by the 11-year-old girl to watch Manchester City's captain. Vodafone said the fifth-generation network will allow surgeons to share their experiences easily with their colleagues in operating rooms in different cities, while technicians will be able to wear augmented and virtual reality glasses to identify any technical problems from remote locations.
The new network will provide a better and faster gaming experience in high resolutions such as 4K, by sending games instantly via Internet, and without downloading them on gaming devices.
At a press conference organized by Vodafone Thursday, Houghton said: "The Future is ready. It was an amazing opportunity to try the services provided by the fifth generation network personally. As a player, the most important thing for me is that the network enables me to communicate with my fans anywhere in real time."
Experts hope the 5G network technology will speed up data transfer for smartphones and tablets up to 20 Gbps and reduce the delay to just one millisecond. They also hope this network to be used to advance communications in the Internet of Things industry, which can be used in smart homes and cars.
5G tests are ongoing and the network is expected to be widely deployed within a year or two.
