The mobile industry has passed a number of big milestones over the last two decades, which in retrospect have led to fundamental changes to our society. When mobile data traffic surpassed mobile voice traffic in 2009, it was difficult to know what today’s use of mobile technology would look like. However, this year will likely go into the history books as the start of an even bigger societal change. 5G and the Internet of Things (IoT) promise new capabilities and use cases, which are set to impact not only consumer services but also many industries embarking on their digital transformations. 2018 will be the year for the first rollouts of 5G networks as well as large-scale deployments of cellular IoT.
This change will require the combined effort of many industry players and regulators to align on spectrum, standards and technology. In this edition of the Ericsson Mobility Report, a closer look is set on the trends that will drive the mobile industry over the next five years. Cellular IoT is growing fast and this has led us to significantly increase our forecast.
By 2023, around 3.5 billion cellular IoT connections are estimated. This growth is set to impact industries and businesses across many different markets. 5G will kick off with enhanced mobile broadband as its first use case. By the end of 2023, there will be 1 billion 5G subscriptions, accounting for around 20 percent of mobile data traffic.
Find out more on Ericsson’s view on IoT and 5G by viewing the full report at this link.
Source: Ericsson
