Japan and South Korea are some of the countries that have already put 6G networks on the horizon. Although 5G is many years away from being used and not yet fully deployed, the predictions are Mobile traffic will increase 20-fold over the next decade. It’s time to start the next generation.

Communications networks have been constantly improving since the first military radio waves in World War II. The transition to civilian systems occurred in the early 1950s with analog radio systems predominantly on FM frequencies and with services in the HF and VHF bands offered by American Bell. We had to wait until 1973, when Motorola CEO Martin Cooper contacted his biggest rival in the sector, Joel Engel of AT&T’s Bell Labs, from a street in New York, in what is believed to be the first call in history from a mobile phone.

In 1979, Japan launched the first mobile network service. In 1981 it was Europe and in 83 North America. From there, the story is more familiar. In such a globalized world, none of this would be possible without the standardization, improvement and evolution of communication network protocols and their support by operators. Every decade since the 1980s, it has released a new generation of a The goal of 6G networks is 2030.

6G networks, are they necessary in the short term?

If you think 5G networks haven’t delivered on all their promises, you’re not alone. 3D, VR, Metaverse… The technology industry usually raises various concepts on the altars. Marketing departments get heated, and what happens happens: many of them fail. It’s true that 5G hasn’t been fully deployed, and as it does, we can expect to get closer with the promised improvements in speed, latency and reliability.

Moreover, the industry will not stand still and 3GPP version 18 will mark the beginning 5G-advanced, the final specification of which should be completed next summer. It is expected to bring a number of evolutionary improvements as well as new features that may address the limitations of the initial 5G rollout. 5G-Advanced introduces support for non-terrestrial networks (such as satellite connections) that increase coverage in remote and rural areas and is claimed to offer better uplink speeds.

It will be a transition to 6G networks. Some analysts believe that it cannot wait. At first glance, it would appear to be more of the same: faster speeds, more ubiquitous networks, more connected devices, lower latency, and generally support for demanding applications such as augmented reality. But there is one more fundamental goal: cut your overall energy consumption in half mobile networks.

Performance and AI

If predictions come true, 6G performance will be truly impressive with science fiction data speeds: 1 petabit per second. Put the data into perspective and say yes 100,000 times higher than the theoretical maximum of 5G or the equivalent of 10 million channels broadcasting at 8K per second. A speed that will be reduced in the real world, but which will be extraordinary all the same, and which will definitely replace cable networks, as they will support 10 times more connected devices than 5G.

Machine learning and artificial intelligence, which are so popular today, are expected to play a critical role in the development of all phases of 6G networks, including design, implementation and operation. As the network evolves to support flexible, programmable cloud-native deployments, network automation will be key to simplifying the management and optimization of networks that will become “cognitive” in the sense that things like network location, virtualized network functions, sharding, quality of service, mobility management, radio resource management and spectrum sharing, will depend to varying degrees on artificial intelligence.

The first implementations hope to be able to offer speeds of 100 Gbps, depending on the spectrum used. Other concepts for future 6G networks include network sensing and even greater connectivity for industrial automation and IoT projects. Concepts for 6G so far appear to focus on making mobile networks more ubiquitous and creating capacity and performance for demanding applications as well as use in devices beyond mobile phones.