The implications of 5G network slicing for video

One of the most important enabling technologies for the roll out of 5G video is network slicing. Here’s a piece written for a client that examines what it is and why it’s important to their customers’ media business.

There are few technologies more eagerly awaited than 5G. We are still very much in the early days of its rollout, with a mere trickle of devices being able to connect to a scattering of isolated urban network pockets, but already the hype surrounding it is fierce. Fifth generation cellular network technology looks set to transform the world to almost the same extent as the arrival of the World Wide Web, promising higher bandwidths around the 1Gbps mark, lower latency, and always on connections. 5G will enable autonomous cars, provide the backbone for the Internet of Things, and even see the death of traditional broadcast as broadcasters move wholesale over to transmitting via the standard.

These are rather breathless claims (and there are plenty more, an Intel and Ovum Report claims that the global media industry stands to gain $765bn in cumulative revenues from new services and applications enabled by 5G) but what gives them credibility is network slicing, a new virtual network architecture that changes the way that networks are built and run, and allows network operators to prioritise different aspects of the service to different clients.

Full article here.