The future of IoT driven by the 5G revolution
5G will inspire and promote a variety of new business cases for the IoT, representing massive opportunities for new sources of revenue streams and the foundation of economic growth shortly.
With a focus on open access and multiple connectivity schemes, 5G will enable the way for a whole new range of solutions, services, and applications, with a progressive technological change towards new borders, affecting connectivity in many industries, including automotive, entertainment, agriculture, manufacturing and IT.
Machine-to-machine and IoT innovation demand changes in the overall architecture, as a movement towards cognitive networks. The telecommunications companies will require infrastructure on demand, agile and programmable, as well as systems beyond the radio so that they are optimized in the cloud and can use the analysis of big data and artificial intelligence.
Communication technologies used in IoT currently
- LTE Cat-NB1
It is a proposed low power technology (LPWA) that is designed to work anywhere and can connect low power devices to the mobile network. Cat-NB1 is optimized to handle infrequent data transfers, which makes it ideal for devices that are deployed in remote locations and only need to transfer data from time to time. - LTE Cat-M1
It is a set of chips / LTE networks that are designed for IoT applications. It consumes less energy, comes with an improved battery and is compatible with everything from water monitoring systems, to asset trackers and consumer electronic products.
The two standards are slightly different in the same bet: a less expensive solution with less capacity can offer enough flexibility to satisfy not only the current cases of IoT use but also those that have not yet been invented.
If we think about our current IoT needs, what matters to us are three things: price, coverage and lower energy consumption.
The big argument against the current dedicated networks of IoT
The deployment of low-power, narrow-band IoT networks also carries a certain degree of risk. In short, the need for bandwidth moves in only one direction: up. No matter what use cases are initially planned, people always want to do more and more with the available networks. It seems possible that these new networks will soon be limited by the same limitations that made them attractive in the first place.
The previous 4G system considerably improved its problems of delay and efficiency but has become obsolete with the introduction of this 5th generation, which is already designed for total versatility, scalability, and energy savings. That means that all devices and networks created between them using IoT technology will use only what is necessary and how much is needed to operate, merely consuming what is available.
There is a multitude of use cases that become a reality in a 5G world, many of which are related to the consumer. Applications based on underlying technologies, such as augmented reality, virtual reality, telepresence, and artificial intelligence, will benefit from massive data flows and ultra-low latency. Industrial automation and robotics will finally be a reality in an extensive area network. And finally, 5G will bring us closer to the realization of the right IoT world of millions of sensor devices connected to the network.
5G and IoT
5G allows the implementation and allocation of dedicated “network segments” where, within a coverage area or functional limit, different services and solutions could occupy their segment of the network, with different speeds, guaranteed quality of service and reports. For IoT, this will create new possibilities for connected devices in all market sectors. There could be a portion that supports the services of connected cars, while another is serving environmental monitoring devices. The latter can only transmit when certain conditions change, while a part of related car services may always be sharing traffic or route information to cars passing through a new enhanced network transmission.
Today, most revenues of the operator come from IoT connectivity, but shortly, revenues also will come from the platforms, applications, and services. Operators capable of creating and providing intelligent platforms, facilitating the collaboration of ecosystems and even becoming a transformation partner for other industries, converting the massive data into smart data will be able to create incremental revenues based on the value of the data instead of only in the volume.
All this consumption and inter-connectivity requires the transmission of large amounts of data and, of course, a significant number of simultaneous connections. For this, the future, or rather, the present, requires greater efficiency and lower energy consumption when it comes to enjoying technology.
IoT, 5G and Edge Computing
Ten years ago, most discussions about cloud computing warned about security and the difficulties of migration with public clouds. Today, most experts believe that the cloud is more secure, more scalable and comprehensive for any agile IT architecture. But a constant in the debate about the viability of cloud computing is that some applications and data can not be easily migrated and operated in the cloud. We need alternative architectures to accommodate what cannot be quickly moved.
As a result, the Multi-cloud strategy, in which companies use public clouds, private premises, and hybrid models, has become the surest way to the success of the cloud. Multi-cloud also applies to high bandwidth applications and devices. They will increasingly benefit from state-of-the-art computer architectures.
Here we discuss how the growth of new technologies, such as 5G wireless technologies, require multi-cloud approaches, including cutting-edge computing architectures.
What is edge computing?
Perimeter computing brings the resources of the cloud (computing, storage, and networks) closer to applications, devices, and users. It does this by using small cellular power stations to allow data to travel at high speeds, without having to cover long distances to a cloud or data center.
The trend in edge computing is to bring machine learning, artificial intelligence, Internet of Things (IoT) data processing, the ability to run containers and even the ability to run full virtual machines directly on a wide range of devices.
The IoT-enabled devices have made perimeter computing architecture a necessity for businesses. While machine-to-machine communication (the basis of IoT) has existed for decades, the current IoT has evolved due to the number of devices, the amount and speed of the data they are transmitting and the ability to better integrate machine learning. On the device.
Speed, volume and new capabilities have made cloud computing unrealistic for devices that require data processing in milliseconds. The latency is too big.
Edge computing and 5G
Perimeter computing devices, especially IoT devices, depend on network access to the cloud to receive machine learning and complex event processing models. In the same way, these devices need access to the network to send sensor and status data to the cloud. To satisfy these devices and connectivity needs, both businesses and consumers need more bandwidth, support for more devices in the network and greater security to protect and manage data.
But this does not mean that perimeter computing architecture should not be implemented now. Most of the leading providers of cloud services offer multiple services to support state-of-the-art computing.
Many of these IoT devices will continue to use the gateway and other aggregating devices to control the volume of data that is sent to the cloud and the types of data. Many of these devices can be replaced without affecting existing IoT devices when versions ready for 5G are available.
The most important thing is that the companies that will have the most success in these ongoing transformations will be those that identify ways to promote innovation, create agility and encourage the change of the business through the use of these technologies.
5G predictions
- It is estimated that mobile data traffic will increase eight times during the forecast period to reach about 107 exabytes (EB) per month, a figure that is equal to that of all mobile subscribers in the world that transmit Full HD video for 10 hours.
- By 2023, it is expected that more than 20 percent of mobile data traffic worldwide will be transported by 5G networks. This traffic is 1.5 times more than the total 4G / 3G / 2G traffic currently.
- It is expected that 5G will be implemented first in dense urban areas with improved mobile broadband and fixed wireless access as the first cases of commercial use. Other use cases will come from industries such as automotive, manufacturing, public services, and health.
- The deployment of 5G will continue to be “highly concentrated” in Japan, Korea, Europe, China and North America (with Japan and Korea in the lead).
