5G Maturity Model: If 5G is a Race, How should we Measure it?
It has become a cliché to say that mobile has transformed every industry. While the industry was born back in the seventies, it wasn’t until 4G and LTE came along that mobile really started to intersect with the larger global economics. The high-speed broadband capability has its obvious advantages of connecting people and things with information at rapid speed. Not only were the existing industries impacted, but we also started to create some new ones like rideshare that totally upended the transportation sector or mobile video advertising that reshaped not only traditional advertising but also digital advertising. Governments started to realize the importance of a healthy and robust mobile ecosystem for their respective countries. US clearly led the way for the last decade and the economic activity that mushroomed from it has been unprecedented. The likes of Apple, Google, Facebook, Microsoft, Amazon, Netflix, and Uber have thrived in this environment. China found its voice on the global stage with the advent of Alibaba, Tencent, Xiaomi, Huawei, and Baidu. India’s commerce sector started to explode with Paytm, FlipKart, and Ola.
The purpose of this paper is to discuss a first of its kind 5G Maturity Model and the variables that are important to the analysis. The paper looks at 25 different variables across five different dimensions for 16 major markets to get a sense of where countries are in their 5G journey. While the framework in this paper focuses on comparing nations on 5G maturity, the model can also be used to compare 5G maturity amongst the operators. The 5G Maturity Model is a living framework that can be updated and adapted on a regular basis as more data becomes available to get a sense of global 5G competitiveness at any given point in time.
