According to the latest data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, as of November 2021, China has built 1.396 million 5G base stations, becoming the country with the widest 5G network coverage in the world.
The construction principle of "moderately advanced" 5G networks in China has laid a solid network foundation for application development. At present, all parties in the industry have fully carried out innovative practices, actively explored application scenarios, and carried out pilot demonstrations in many fields, and in 2022, 5G applications are expected to achieve multi-point blossoming in more fields and in a deeper range.
In 2022, China's 5G base stations are expected to exceed 2 million
According to Xie Cun, director of the Department of Information and Communication Development of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, at present, the number of 5G base stations in China accounts for more than 70% of the world, which is the world's largest and most technologically advanced 5G independent networking network, and all prefecture-level cities and urban areas in the country, more than 97% of county towns and urban areas and 40% of townships and towns have achieved 5G network coverage.
Under the vigorous construction of 5G base stations, China has built more than 2300 virtual private networks and hybrid private networks. According to the forecast of China's top ten trends in 5G in 2022 released by CCID Consultants, the 5G network will extend from urban depth coverage to township breadth coverage.
For the development of 5G networks, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology has also clarified the construction goals, in 2022 to carry out the construction of 5G and Gigabit optical networks in a safe and orderly manner, it is expected that by the end of 2022, China's 5G base stations will exceed 2 million, and the number of 5G terminal connections will reach 600 million.
5G applications are about to usher in an explosive period
With the improvement of 5G network construction, 5G applications are covering many areas of the industry, and the potential of 5G to empower the digital transformation of the economy and society is also being released. According to Han Xia, chief engineer of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, nearly 50% of 5G applications have achieved commercial landing. According to statistics, there are currently more than 10,000 cases of 5G application innovation in the country, covering 22 important industries of the national economy.
Taking the industrial Internet as an example, the industrial Internet is widely used in more than 40 key industries of the national economy, such as steel, machinery, transportation, and energy, of which the "5G + Industrial Internet" has more than 1,800 projects under construction, forming 20 typical application scenarios such as remote equipment control, machine vision quality inspection, and production energy efficiency control. These typical application scenarios have strong replication promotion and application demonstration value, and 5G+ industrial Internet applications in 2022 are expected to achieve large-scale replication.
In terms of personal applications, China's 5G application development foundation is solid, and the user group has become a scale. Among them, 5G news shows a good development trend. Zhao Wenjun, director of the Government and Enterprise Product Promotion Division of the Product Center of China Telecom Marketing Department, said a few days ago that he plans to choose the opportunity to promote the commercial use of 5G news in January 2022.
At the same time, in the new information consumption industry, the key layout of the force, around the meta-universe extended out of the VR and AR and high-definition video industry with technology integration and innovation as the entry point, phased and gradually promote personal applications to go deeper into reality.
In addition, 5G applications in education, medical and other fields are also accelerating. In the future, 5G high-quality boutique networks are expected to drive multi-point blossoming in the field of information consumption such as game entertainment, live event broadcasting, and residential services.
Li Jun, a fund manager at Huaxia, predicts that 2022 is a high probability of being a first year for the landing of 5G applications, and I believe that this first year is the starting point of a golden track in the future.
Steady growth has led to the vigorous development of the industrial chain
2022 is considered by the market to be the first year of the great development of 5G applications, which is expected to drive the rapid growth of traffic and data transmission demand, and specifically design optical modules, IDCs, servers and other amplifications. Peng Jian, deputy director of the Radio Management Research Institute of the China Electronics Information Industry Development Research Institute, said that 5G, as an important component of new infrastructure, can play a direct role in stabilizing investment by laying out a number of new 5G infrastructure projects, and drive the coordinated and steady development of upstream and downstream enterprises in the 5G industry chain.
According to data released by the China Academy of Information and Communications Technology, the three basic telecom operators plan 5G capital expenditures totaling 184.7 billion yuan in 2021, an increase of 5.1% over 2020. Ding Yun, president of Huawei's carrier BG, said that in countries and regions with rapid 5G development, operators who have invested heavily in 5G have achieved remarkable commercial returns.
According to the operational data released by the three major operators, as of November 2021, the number of 5G package users exceeded 700 million, and the penetration rate of 5G users has crossed the critical point of 20%, and has entered a new pattern of spiral development of user growth, commercial returns, and network construction.
There are many links in the 5G industry chain, including parts, main equipment, and downstream applications in addition to operators. The prospective industry research institute report pointed out that in 2022, with the increase in the number of macro stations and small stations, it is expected that the investment scale of communication network equipment (main equipment) will peak at 78.5 billion yuan, which will undoubtedly benefit the upstream of the industrial chain, especially Huawei, ZTE and other suppliers who have won the bid for many times.
Huaxi Securities said that the overall capital expenditure of the three major operators in 2021 increased by 2% year-on-year, of which 5G-related capital expenditure increased by 5% year-on-year, and the next 2 to 3 years will drive the industry into a new round of growth cycle.