In a press conference held this Wednesday, Verizon officials announced the launch of the 5G service that will be available to certain users of the telecommunications company. This release represents the biggest attempt at expanding this new service concerning all the companies that already offer similar features like 4G/LTE technology.
The 5G service is considered a next-generation wireless technology, and for that reason, Verizon will try a relatively small launch in Ann Arbor (Michigan), Atlanta, Bernardsville (New Jersey), Brockton, (Massachusetts), Dallas, Denver, Houston, Miami, Sacramento, Seattle and Washington, DC. Users in those cities will be able to access this technology. The 5G service could be from 10 to 100 times faster than the current wireless services in the market, as it would have a download speed of 10 gigabits per second.
This new Verizon expansion and development represents a significant change in what society knows as wireless technology. This new service promises a super-fast connection that can even offer the possibility to create links between things like a car and a refrigerator.
However, all the advances that the company has presented regarding 5G technology can be considered more like a hype than actual progress in the telecommunications field, as users have not lived the tangible benefits the company promises. Added to that, Verizon is not the only company working in this direction, as 5G technology seems like the future of wireless telecommunications.
For instance, the release of this technology announced by Verizon is not exactly for the mobile phone market. It is more like a substitute connection of the broad bands of homes and offices in the 11 selected cities.
“The 5G systems we are deploying will soon provide wireless broadband service to homes, enabling customers to experience cost-competitive gigabit speeds that were previously only deliverable via fiber,” said Woojune Kim, vice president of the Samsung team in charge of 5G and a partner for the Verizon deployment.
Verizon’s goal and upcoming launches
According to Adam Koeppe, Vice President, Network Planning at Verizon, this 5G technology is evolving rapidly, and this is because the efforts of the company are oriented to that objective. He explained that network density is in expansion as it hopes to meet the public’s demands. Added to that fact, Koeppe stated that thanks to the Federal Communications Commission “aggressive action on 5G spectrum,” they can deliver the next generation of wireless services, as the time is “right.”
However, Verizon has received a lot of critics regarding how limited this service would be, as nobody knows what has to be done to be selected for the 5G testing. The company has stated that they hope to offer the service to thousands of homes and businesses as they will choose the customers base in the distance between them and the newly built sites.
Verizon is not the only company trying to expand its services as AT&T has run a 5G service in a broadband replacement for one of their Intel offices in Austin, Texas. In that same city, they did trials of the technology with their new DirecTV Now service, as they have announced more developments to be launched in the second semester of the year.
Source: Cnet