As telecom operators gear up for 5G, the big question is do they have enough spectrum.

Joe Kelly, vice-president for international media affairs at Huawei Technologies, said that spectrum is controlled by the governments.

“There are ways to address the spectrum. The first one is innovation. 3G networks used spectrum three times more efficiently than 2G. 4G networks used spectrum three times more efficiently than 3G. So 4G is 12 times more efficient than 2G. As we move to 5G, there will be multiplier effect. So the same spectrum will give more. Technically, there are things we can do to make the same spectrum more efficient,” he said.

He said that there are two kinds of spectrum. One is regulated and the other is unregulated spectrum. “When you use the remote control to change the TV channels, it uses unregulated spectrum. Some 5G networks will also use unregulated spectrum. In IoT, there is something called narrow band. What narrow band IoT does is that it uses very little bandwidth and low power,” he said.

Governments tend to auction the spectrum in European countries. In Japan, China and Korea, the cost is very small.

“The spectrum for 5G will be different for each country and governments have to balance the spectrum for telecoms, air traffic controls and TV services,” he said.

Many countries are testing 5G in different spectra depending on the availability

source : gulfnews