5G and mobile connectivity: Our vision for the next 10 years

Digitization will have an impact on all areas of life and technology will open up entirely new opportunities for all of us. But we needn’t look that far into the future: the shaping of our future begins today. We have just started into the decade of mobile communications in which mobile communication will become the basis of almost every kind of interaction. And 5G will be the key enabler for innovation and development.

For me, four thoughts are central when we talk about 5G and our vision for the next ten years:

1) 5G not only brings great opportunities for business. In future, there will be no economic growth and prosperity without 5G.

5G will not only be evolutionary. With its potential in speed and latency 5G will be disruptive. Only with 5G the factory of the future will evolve, in which machines and software systems are communicating with each other without noticeable delay. For the long run: No factory which will further operate in traditional ways will be able to compete this in terms of time, efficiency and costs. With 5G, intelligent networking via the Internet of Things will be experiencing a significantly wider range of applications. This is referred to as "Massive IoT" - the networking of millions of devices with one another. We already see high industry demand for our 5G campus solutions. An independent campus network ensures the intelligent connectivity of manufacturing machines and facilities. We have already successfully delivered the first proof point: We have established a modern 5G campus network for Mercedes Benz-Cars in the Factory 56 together with Ericsson, which will enable a digital, flexible and more effective car production once the factory will have been opened. In addition, the upcoming 5G mobile communications standard will enable groundbreaking new applications and therefore open up entirely new business fields. There can be no doubt that if we as the leading economy in Europe will not keep up with this development we will lose touch. Therefore: To exploit all the opportunities, the new technology can offer, Telefónica Deutschland will invest considerable resources into the launch of 5G. Based on our user-oriented mind-set, the company will offer the new mobile communications standard in the O2 network to both private and business customers in Germany in the course of this year. We just started to build up our 5G network in Germany. By the end of 2021, Telefónica Deutschland will provide 5G to large parts of Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, Cologne and Frankfurt. And by the end of 2022, we are planning to supply 30 big cities – summing up to a total of 16 million people - with 5G. This will require investments worth billions of euros in the coming years. We have therefore significantly increased our usual investment framework. On our way to become Mobile Customer and Digital Champion, we ensure that Germany is transformed into a fully connected and mobile society. With regard to ourselves, it is clear, that the changes 5G will bring to the economy and society will also have an impact on our own company and our business model. There will be new applications, new digital business fields from which new value chains will develop. This will also lead to new customer relationships and partnerships. Of course, this does not only apply to us as a telecommunications company, but generally to more or less all companies and other industries. And it also affects our personal lives. I believe:

2) 5G will have more impact on our personal daily lives than any other mobile communications technology has ever had before.

Of course, introducing 2G revolutionized the way people communicated via telephone, simply because they did not depend on local phones any more but could communicate wherever they were. 3G enabled us to send messages and 4G opened the door to mobile high speed data. With 5G, we will experience higher speed, more network capacity for the use of various applications and extremely short latency times for real-time communications. But it will go beyond this. 5G will change our individual lives as well as our societal live from a much broader perspective. Only with 5G connected driving will reach the level that cars can really steer independently through traffic. Only with 5G, it will be possible to have secure, remote surgeries. Only with 5G smart cities will develop their true potential by intelligently managing traffic flows, sustainably controlling energy consumption and connecting buildings with the environment. In short, all these technologies require transmission speeds and capacities that go beyond the current 4G networks. Today, LTE already provides high speed which enables us to use our daily applications and tools – and the performance limit of LTE is still far from being reached. But 5G can be 100 times faster than this. And 5G will continue to evolve. The data speed will further increase. The leap in transmission capacity is just as huge. With 5G, a multiple of data can be transmitted within a radio cell and more devices can be connected. Let me give you an example: Imagine you are sitting in a soccer stadium or visiting a festival – together with tens of thousands of people. Thanks to the high capacities of the 5G network, all visitors can easily upload their impressions simultaneously to social media, stream videos of other users in parallel and receive exciting and entertaining additional information about the event. Talking about a mobile society, we should realize that our digital future will also have an impact on the environment. This brings me to my third thought:

3) Without 5G and the further digitization resulting from it, climate targets will not be reached.

Besides all the great opportunities for business and society, we must openly address the challenges that come together with digitization: climate change. The digital economy is already responsible for around 4% of global greenhouse gases. By comparison, the civil aviation sector accounted for 2% of greenhouse gases in 2018. And the emissions of the digital economy are expected to continue to rise sharply. We are all using our digital devices more and more intensively. The hunger for data grows with the capabilities of our devices. And, for sure – further digitization will push that even more. As a digital company, we must therefore, more than ever, address the question of what contribution we can make to an even more sustainable world. Today, Telefónica Deutschland connects more people in Germany than any other network operator. This leads to an enormous responsibility for us. In the fight against climate change, we initiated far-reaching measures early on: in 2016, we were the first industry to commit to the sustainability goals of the United Nations. At Telefónica Deutschland 100% of the energy that we procure and control ourselves comes from renewable energy sources. And as it comes to 5G, I’m convinced that we have a technology at hand that will enable people to live and work more sustainably. 5G connectivity and data will provide us with new technological options to make our world more energy-efficient. Smart cities, smart energy networks, intelligent traffic control, connected driving and new, more efficient mobility solutions: 5G is a prerequisite for many smart technologies that can help us tackle climate change. Only 5G networks provide the capacities and transmission speeds required for these digital solutions. Another positive aspect is that 5G is much more efficient than 4G. For example, 5G antennas require 90% less energy to transport the same amount of data. Thinking about the rapidly growing volume of data, this is actually very good news. But - Besides all the opportunities 5G brings along, an increasing digitized and connected society also bares more room for cyber-attacks. What brings me to my fourth point:

4) 5G will make our digitalized world safer when we as society truly face the challenges lying ahead of us.

Although network security becomes much more challenging with the increasing amount of connected devices, 5G also provides more opportunities for more security, e.g. through encryption measures and network slicing possibilities. But: All areas throughout the provision and usage cycle of 5G need to be addressed. This includes manufacturers, mobile operators, individual user and politics. Of course, for ourselves the safety of our networks always has key priority at Telefónica Deutschland. This includes, that all net technology by external service providers is tested comprehensively prior to its launch and we closely monitor our own systems. In addition, we are in close collaboration with further leading companies along the global “Cybersecurity Tech Accord”. In this context we should also face the frequently discussed topic on how to use different network suppliers for expanding the 5G network. On a broader perspective, our focus as a European telecommunication industry should be to strengthen the European market. Allowing competition throughout suppliers – without excluding a certain one – and defining a clear safety catalogue, will support us in doing so. On the other hand, the industry must ensure to make all their devices and digital apps the safest they can be for their customers to avoid spying and hacking attacks. I’m talking about Smartphones, infotainment systems, apps like WhatsApp and others. For us as individual users, this means choosing our gadgets and applications wisely. On top of this, the political framework is crucial and as a European telecommunications company we strongly feel the need for a holistic European solution.

To sum up: There is nothing comparable to 5G. The next ten years will be the decade of mobile communications, with more and more people and devices connected with each other. Looking at economy: There will be no economic growth and prosperity without 5G – and the German economy will benefit massively from 5G. 5G offers us a unique opportunity to fully exploit our strengths as a globally leading industry nation. Looking at the impact on our personal daily lives: More than any other mobile telecommunication technology before, 5G will change the way we work and live and it will touch all aspects of life including mobility, health, education as well as our homes and our cities. Therefore, digitization is having an enormous impact on the environment - with 5G playing a key role in resolving the climate crisis. And when society as a whole joins all forces from economy, politics and consumers and faces the challenges a more and more digitized and connected world has to tackle, 5G can help take security to another level. For me, all these thoughts I have shared with you today are based on a fundamental belief: Technological progress does not follow a predetermined plan. It can be shaped. We as citizens and as society in general need to shape our digital future together. We as a company have a clear vision: With Telefónica and O2 we enable our customers to participate in the 5G-century. We put them at the center of all our activities and open up digital opportunities for everyone.