See how TELUS 5G technology will propel innovation, cutting-edge research and development in smart medicine, health, cyber security, and more.
With this exciting change, our prediction is that in 5-10 years we will look back at 2022 where it all started…
What is 5G?
5G is the next-generation cellular standard.
- In techno babble: “The standard targets maximum downlink and uplink throughputs of 20 Gbps and 10 Gbps respectively. Latency is as low as 4 milliseconds in a mobile scenario and can be as low as 1 millisecond in ultra-reliable low-latency communication scenarios, and massive scalability. New system architecture includes core slicing as well as wireless edge”.
- In layman terms: 5G technology is introducing significantly faster networks that will allow the transfer of significantly more data in less time. It also introduces the ability to connect more devices and more types of devices to the network at the same time.
Why this is important:
Previous mobile networks such as 4G can experience challenges when handling many devices at the same location. You may have experienced this when trying to use your smartphone at a crowded event. 5G solves this issue by intelligently transmitting to each device, enabling it to handle up to 1 million devices per square kilometer. With IoT, the number of devices that connect to the internet has been increasing at a rate of about18% year-over-year. The ability to connect more devices is therefore very important.
While 4G made cloud services useable on smartphones, 5G technology takes this to a whole new level. A 5G network has so much processing power built in, that it becomes more than a network. Processing intense tasks, like Artificial Reality, could be handled by the network instead of your smartphone, improving both performance and saving battery. This makes new types of battery-powered devices, like light-weight Artificial Reality Glasses possible in the classroom and enables things like coordinated IoT devices.
We could go on, but you get the point: 5G will drive digital transformation across multiple industries, including ours!
Why is this exciting for the University?
5G opens new capabilities for the University, such as increasing our ability to manage large amounts of data in real time. It’s quite easy to envision how medical research, among others, could benefit from this capability. It will also open new pedagogical and student experience opportunities which could provide a competitive advantage.
Over the course of the next month, a series of campus experts in technology, learning, research, pedagogy, infrastructure operations, inclusion, innovation, and adoption and impact of technology will be deep diving into opportunities for leveraging this emerging technology. A formal report will be produced and shared.
This is an exciting time. 5G is still in its early stages. By starting our journey now, the University will be very well positioned to leverage 5G use cases as they increasingly become available over the course of the next 2 to 5 years.
In 5-10 years, 5G will be mainstream and we will take it for granted…like we do now with 4G capabilities (go back 10 years and try having a real-time team video conference with 15 people on the University’s Network). We will be able to point to 2022 as the year our adventure started!