2019 5G Application Scenario Research Report

What is the difference between 5G - user groups

 

C-end market growth is weak, B-end applications will become the main driving force for 5G development

 

The growth of the C-end market is weak, and the B-end application will become the main driving force for the development of 5G. As far as the C-end market is concerned, on the one hand, the penetration rate of mobile users has reached 112.2%, the growth is weak and the ARPU is declining year by year. On the other hand, the rapid development of the mobile Internet has led to rapid growth in user traffic. However, due to the speed-up and fee reduction, the price war of operators, etc., the overall traffic has increased dramatically and the income has remained the same. Overall, the C-end user scale has reached its limit, revenue has started to decline, and the C-end market has become saturated. Relatively speaking, the vertical industry application market has great potential, on the one hand, because the Internet of Things connection will far exceed the mobile Internet. On the other hand, 5G, as the foundation of the digital transformation of the industry, will create higher application value.

 

What is the difference between 5G - terminal maturity

 

5G terminal has high maturity and rapid development

 

As mentioned above, industry applications will become the main driving force for 5G development. Faced with diverse scenarios, 5G terminals will evolve along a variety of forms and interactions. The national policies have been strongly supported, and communication companies have worked together. In the first year of 5G commercialization, the types and quantities of terminals have far exceeded expectations. The rapid development speed is unmatched by the mobile communication technologies of the past generations. In the first year of 4G commercial use, there are only 4 4G terminals on the market, and as of September 10 this year, there are 136 5G terminals, which promoted the development of 5G industry applications.

 

 

Network: How to deploy 5G networks

 

5G networking mode

 

To meet different needs, 3GPP defines two 5G networking modes: NSA and SA.

 

To meet the needs of different operators' 5G network construction, 3GPP defines two 5G networking modes: NSA (non-independent networking) and SA (independent networking) from two perspectives. From the perspective of 5G, the NSA is 5G network to connect to the EPC (4G core network) with the 4G base station as the control plane anchor, or 5GC (5G core network) with the enhanced 4G base station as the control plane anchor point. The opposite is SA. From the perspective of 4G, the 4G network should use the 5G base station as the control plane anchor to access the 5GC, and vice versa. In the early days of standard development, 3GPP proposed 8 kinds of 5G networking modes. The standards released in 2017 are preferred to Option 2, Option 3/3a/3x, Option 4/4a, Option 5, and Option 7/7a/7x networking architectures. At present, the five network architectures have been completed with the three sub-versions of NSA, SA and late drop in 3GPP R15. From the perspective of 5G, Option2, Option4/4a belong to the SA architecture, and Option3/3a/3x, Option5, and Option7/7a/7x belong to the NSA architecture. From different perspectives, the results are different. This report mainly defines two networking modes from the perspective of 5G.

 

 

NSA and SA network performance

 

SA networking can truly support ultra-high reliability and low latency services.

 

Subject to the core network and air interface of 4G (LTE), the 5G network of the NSA networking cannot truly achieve the millisecond-level end-to-end delay. The NSA network is mainly based on a 4G network. The 5G base station is equivalent to adding additional resources to expand the existing 4G network to meet high-speed service requirements. The SA network does not depend on the 4G network. The 5G base station and the 5G core network are separately networked. The new network architecture and various 5G key technologies work together. The 5G network can truly achieve high reliability and low latency. Delay and reliability are a pair of bundled indicators. There is a trade-off between the two. While studying how to reduce the end-to-end delay of mobile communication systems, we must consider the reliability indicators. The delay of the mobile communication system mainly consists of air interface delay, bearer network delay, core network delay and PDN delay. The 5G is designed from the system perspective and the overall planning is to reduce the end-to-end delay. Therefore, only by adopting the SA network, can we use a variety of new technologies to achieve the goal of high reliability and low latency from the overall system. The SA network mainly adopts technologies such as control and forwarding separation, network slicing, core network function sinking and mobile edge computing to establish a new network architecture to reduce system delay, adopt new frame structure, reduce TTI, reduce data transmission interval, and resources. Reserving, D2D and other technologies to reduce air interface delay, adopting pass-through forwarding technology, FLEX-E technology, reducing NP processing delay, reducing TM scheduling delay to reduce bearer network delay, and cooperating with new technologies in different parts of the whole system. It can reduce the end-to-end delay and truly support high-reliability and low-latency service applications.

 

NSA and SA network development speed

 

SA network develops slowly compared to NSA networking

 

The development speed of the new generation of mobile communication networks is mainly determined by the speed of standard setting, the progress of equipment manufacturers and the speed of network construction by operators. The three are carried out in turn, and the progress of any link will affect the maturity cycle of the entire network. From a standard setting perspective, the NSA is completed earlier than the SA standard. As mentioned above, the 5G standard is divided into two phases, R15 and R16. The first phase was completed in June this year. The R15 NSA standard was completed in December 2017 and the R15 SA standard was completed in June 2018. The second phase is expected to be completed in March 2020. The second phase of 5G mainly studies the improvement of 5G application scenarios and the improvement of 5G performance. On the one hand, research on high reliability and low latency will be further carried out to meet industrial application scenarios such as industrial manufacturing and power control, and V2X based on 5G new air interface will be studied to meet the application scenarios of advanced autonomous driving. On the other hand, 5G performance is improved in terms of MIMO evolution, new air interface mobility enhancement, remote interference management, and cross-link interference suppression. It can be seen that after the completion of the R16 standard, the 5G network of the SA network can truly support the industrial application scenarios with high reliability and low latency. However, the R15 SA standard has been completed. After the device manufacturer passes the SA test, the operator can first build a 5G network based on the SA networking mode. The completion time of the standard directly affects the progress of the equipment manufacturer. Currently, the NSA is faster, and the SA is still in the testing stage. From the perspective of network construction, the NSA is attached to the 4G network and only needs to deploy 5G base stations. The construction speed is fast. The SA network needs to build new base stations and core networks, which is slow. Overall, the SA network is slower and matures later than the NSA network. However, SA is the final form of 5G. To achieve the performance of 5G technology, the NSA network will eventually evolve to the SA network.

 

 

Domestic 5G network deployment

 

5G network is expected to have ultra-high reliability and low latency before and after 2023.

 

On June 6, 2019, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology issued 5G licenses to China Mobile, China Telecom, China Unicom and China Radio and Television, which means that China officially entered the 5G commercial year. Unlike China Radio and Television, which can only use SA networking, the other three major operators can have more choices in 5G network deployment. However, no matter which construction method is adopted, the SA network supporting high reliability, low latency and large connection is the final form of China's 5G network. In July of this year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology required that mobile phones that entered the network in 2020 must support both NSA and SA. Only mobile phones that support NSA are not allowed to access the network. This also shows the attitude of the government in supporting 5G SA networking. The R16 standard is expected to be completed in March 2020. It takes nearly one year for each equipment manufacturer to develop and test. It takes time for operators to deploy the entire network. In the 4G era, it took nearly four years for operators to build a boutique network. According to the 4G network construction speed, the 5G license has just been released, and it takes at least three years to achieve nationwide coverage. Therefore, at present, China's operators choose to smoothly transition from the NSA network to the SA network, or directly adopt the SA network. The 5G network supporting high reliability, low latency and large connection should be basically built before 2023.

 

 

 

Application: What are the application scenarios of 5G?

 

5G application carrier - 5G mobile phone

 

It is recommended to purchase dual-mode 5G mobile phones that support both NSA and SA after 2020, which is the main entrance of mobile Internet, and also the carrier of voice services and various data services. The network standard supported by the 5G mobile phone determines the network it can access. As mentioned above, the 5G has two networking modes, NSA and SA. A single mobile phone that supports one network mode cannot access another network. Due to the early completion of the NSA standard and the rapid maturity of the industry chain, the mobile phone chip supporting NSA has been tested, and the mobile phone chip supporting SA is still in the testing stage, and the development speed is slow. Limited by mobile phone chips, currently only Huawei's mate 30 supports both NSA and SA, and other brands of mobile phones can only support NSA. The Ministry of Industry and Information Technology requires that 5G mobile phones listed in 2020 must support both NSA and SA, and mobile phones that only support NSA will not be able to access the network. It can be predicted that mobile phones that only support NSA will be listed before 2020. China's operators have adopted the SA network as the ultimate goal. Although the NSA and SA hybrid networks may be adopted in the early stage, it means that only the supported NSA phones can only use the 5G network under the NSA network. Therefore, users who want to purchase 5G mobile phones are advised to purchase dual-mode 5G terminals that support both NSA and SA after 2020.