The year 2024 marks the 30th anniversary of the mainland's full-featured access to the Internet. After 30 years of arduous exploration and innovative practice, China's Internet has achieved a continuous leap from scratch, from small to large, and from weak to strong, and has built the world's largest and technologically advanced network infrastructure, promoting the vigorous rise of new applications, new models and new business forms, and becoming an important driving force for the country's high-quality development.
Over the past 30 years, China Telecom has always kept in mind the "great power of the country", and has grown together with China's Internet to promote development and create brilliance together. In the process of leapfrogging development of China's Internet, China Telecom has fully integrated into the construction of "Digital China", continuously accelerated the construction of intelligent and comprehensive digital information infrastructure, consolidated the digital foundation, continued to promote the popularization of digital services, improved the people's digital experience, empowered the development of the digital economy, built a solid digital security barrier, and made great strides on the road to becoming a cyber power.
Weave a big net
Raise the backbone of information
From dial-up Internet access to gigabit broadband, we will build high-quality all-optical networks, from 3G to 5G, we will make every effort to build high-quality mobile networks, and from international submarine cables to satellite communications, we will build all-round access networks...... Over the past 30 years, China Telecom has taken advantage of the situation to speed up the construction of network infrastructure, set up, connect, connect and speed up, make every effort to unblock the information "artery" of economic and social development, and continue to write a new chapter in the development of the mainland's communication network.
On April 20, 1994, the mainland opened a 64kbit/s international dedicated line connected to the Internet, and since then China has been officially recognized as a country with a full Internet function. A year later, in May 1995, ChinaNet, the largest public computer Internet in mainland China, with the widest coverage, the highest speed and the largest number of users, was officially opened to the public, and the large-scale construction of the Internet in China began. In 1999, China Telecom led the Internet to speed up for the first time, upgrading from 56k dial-up Internet access to ADSL Internet access, leading the country into the Internet broadband era. At the beginning of 2011, China Telecom took the lead in launching the construction of "Broadband China Optical Network City", invested a lot of money, manpower and material resources to promote fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) and 100 Gigabit access for users, and in 2017, it took the lead in opening the all-optical network 2.0 era to build an all-optical backbone network with the best scale and performance in the world. In recent years, China Telecom has continued to build all-optical networks, and all prefecture-level cities have been fully built into optical network cities, with 100% broadband access in administrative villages and poverty alleviation villages, and the first to achieve gigabit network upgrades, covering more than 300 cities.
In 2014, the scale of mobile phone netizens in mainland China surpassed the scale of traditional PC netizens for the first time, which is inseparable from the large-scale construction of digital mobile communications sounded by basic telecom companies including China Telecom. Since the commercialization of 4G in 2014 and 5G in 2019, China Telecom has continuously increased its investment in base stations, with more than 2 million 4G intermediate band shared base stations and more than 1.21 million 5G base stations in use, achieving continuous coverage in towns and towns and above, and effective coverage in developed administrative villages.
In addition, China Telecom has also relied on the terrestrial network and expanded the satellite network to actively deploy the three emerging services of Tiantong satellite, aviation Internet and marine broadband, and continue to improve the three-dimensional, wide-coverage and high-performance network layout of "land, sea, air and space".
Over the past 30 years, the Internet has developed rapidly, and a 5G+ optical broadband "dual gigabit" network covers the north and south of the country, carrying the high-speed operation of the digital economy. At present, China Telecom has built the world's largest LTE-FDD network, the world's largest 5G SA co-construction and sharing network, the world's largest NB-IoT network, and the world's largest gigabit optical fiber network, becoming the world's leading Internet operator and the only satellite mobile communication operator in China, and building the industry's first independent and controllable, 5G + satellite, "land, sea, air and space" integrated network.
China Telecom is not only the builder of the information superhighway, but also the builder of the "Information Silk Road", constantly improving the global network system, actively building a high-quality basic bearer network covering countries and regions along the "Belt and Road", and gradually building a multi-level international network pattern with "global transmission channel + global Internet + global cloud node" as the core, providing strong support for global network interconnection.
As the world's first telecom operator to put forward the concept of cloud-network integration development, China Telecom has accelerated the construction of an intelligent and comprehensive digital information infrastructure with cloud-network integration as the core feature, and has evolved to the cloud-network integration 3.0 stage after several years of practice, making an important contribution to opening up the information "artery" of economic and social development. At the same time, China Telecom continues to optimize the computing power layout of "2+4+31+X+O", actively builds a distributed computing infrastructure with cloud intelligence, integrated training and pushing, and cloud-network edge-end collaboration, focuses on the hub node area of the national integrated computing network, increases the construction of intelligent computing capabilities, builds a DCI network with large bandwidth, low latency, high reliability, and intelligence, and builds an east-west 1/10/15ms and north-south 1/5/20ms latency circle to achieve efficient interconnection of distributed computing infrastructure. IN 2023, NEW GENERAL COMPUTING POWER OF 1.0EFLOPS WILL BE ADDED TO REACH 4.1EFLOPS, AND INTELLIGENT COMPUTING POWER OF 8.1EFLOPS WILL BE ADDED TO REACH 11EFLOPS. One city and one pool covers up to 280 cities and more than 1,000 edge nodes, building a new digital foundation for cloud-network integration for the development of the digital economy.
Innovation is surging
Continue to tackle core network technologies
Over the past 30 years, the mainland Internet has achieved leapfrog development from 3G acceleration to 5G leadership, from narrowband to broadband, and from copper cable to optical fiber. China Telecom has always adhered to innovation-driven, focused on tackling key technologies, integrated innovation, strengthened software and hardware construction, etc., promoted breakthroughs in the development of the technology industry, greatly enhanced its core technical capabilities, and emerged a large number of innovative achievements, helping the mainland to build the world's largest and leading network infrastructure.
In 2011, China Telecom launched the construction of "Broadband China Optical Network City", based on passive optical network (PON) technology to build "100 Gigabit into households, Gigabit into buildings, T-level" broadband network capabilities, and took the lead in putting forward the concept of "all-optical network", in 2020, the implementation of XGPON network upgrade, comprehensive implementation of gigabit network deployment, promote the continuous evolution of the backbone "all-optical network 2.0", to achieve inter-provincial and intra-provincial trunk line flat integration, optical switching dimension from 20 to 32 dimensions and other technological breakthroughs. At present, China Telecom has built the world's largest next-generation green and energy-saving ROADM all-optical network covering 31 provinces across the country, supporting rapid service provisioning and automatic fault recovery within minutes.
After obtaining the mobile license in 2008, China Telecom fully provided CDMA-EVDO access to the 3G mobile communication network, and achieved full 3G coverage across the country. Since then, following the development trend of domestic mobile communication technology, the hybrid network of TD-LTE and LTE FDD has been deployed in 56 pilot cities. ON THE BASIS OF THE POPULARIZATION OF 4G, IN 2015, CHINA TELECOM LAUNCHED 4G+ SERVICES, DEPLOYING CARRIER AGGREGATION (CA) BASE STATIONS IN 45 KEY CITIES, PROVIDING A DOWNLOAD SPEED OF 300MBPS, WHICH IS TWICE THE DOWNLOAD SPEED OF ORDINARY 4G NETWORKS. In the construction of 5G, it took the lead among global operators in releasing 5G technology white papers, took the lead in organizing the "5G SA Deployment Guide" jointly formulated by the global 5G industry, and led more than 30 3GPP international standards in 5G super uplink, coverage enhancement, customized private network, baseband performance, etc. China Telecom and China Unicom pioneered a new construction and operation model of "one physical network, two logical networks" for 5G access network, which solved the technical problems of signal processing and radio frequency of large bandwidth and shared networks, and contributed key technologies for co-construction and sharing to the global communications industry.
In cloud-network convergence, China Telecom is the first in the world to achieve three-layer decoupling of the 5G core network through the coupling and linkage of cloud-network technology. At the same time, it actively embraces cloud native, and has successively made breakthroughs in a series of key core technologies such as cloud operating system, elastic computing, cloud storage, cloud network, distributed database, CDN, etc., to build an independent and controllable e cloud technology system. In terms of security, the Group has independently developed key core technologies such as the cloud-network security management platform, and actively built a security capability pool covering the edges of 31 provinces, realizing on-demand selection and flexible deployment of security capabilities, and building a new pattern of security and trustworthiness.
It is worth mentioning that China Telecom also actively responded to the national Eastern Data and Western Computing Project, started the research and practical exploration of the computing network scheduling scheme, innovatively proposed the core protocol CP-BGP of the computing network based on BGP, built an integrated computing network scheduling platform that supports multi-cloud management, and led the development of computing network with innovation, and has won dozens of industry awards.
As a new generation of Internet protocol, IPv6 is the ultimate direction of network infrastructure development and industrial ecosystem construction. As early as 2003, China Telecom carried out IPv6 service demonstration and testing as a member of CNGI. In 2009, as the first operator in China to launch IPv6 trial commercialization, it carried out live network trials in Jiangsu and Hunan, achieving a breakthrough in IPv6 commercialization. In 2013, IPv6 was used to transform metro and access networks in 21 cities in 10 provinces, including Beijing and Shanghai. China Telecom's 4G LTE network is built in full accordance with the IPv6 standard, and it is the first in China to achieve a breakthrough in the application of IPv6 in mobile networks. In recent years, China Telecom has further deepened the large-scale deployment and technological innovation of IPv6, realized the commercial deployment of IPv6 in metro area networks, mobile networks, backbone networks, IDCs, etc., and successfully carried out 5G SA live network trials based on pure IPv6, starting the first exploration of the evolution of carrier networks from dual-stack to single-stack, and in October 2019, China Telecom's R&D achievements of "Carrier-grade IPv6 Technology Innovation and Ultra-large-scale Deployment" were awarded the "World's Leading Internet Scientific and Technological Achievements" , becoming the first telecom operator to receive this honor at the conference.
Promote use through the Internet
Stimulate new momentum for development
Over the past 30 years, the Internet speed in mainland China has achieved an exponential leap from the K era to the M era and then to the G era, 3G has made mobile Internet access a reality, 4G has changed life, and 5G is being integrated into thousands of industries. With the iterative upgrading of information and communication technology, China Telecom has embarked on the road of transformation from transformation 1.0 to 2.0 to 3.0 and then to the full implementation of the "cloud transformation and digital transformation" strategy, continuously integrating 4G/5G, big data, Internet of Things, artificial intelligence and other technologies to help high-quality economic development and carefully serve the transformation and upgrading of all walks of life.
In the field of life, China Telecom actively promotes 5G to fly into thousands of households, taking the integration of "5G + Gigabit broadband + Gigabit WiFi" as the starting point, continues to expand the application of 5G ultra-high definition, 5G cloud VR/AR, and 5G cloud gaming, and innovatively launches new services such as 5G messaging, 5G quantum cryptography, and 5G new calling. Digital solutions such as digital villages have expanded new spaces for digital life. From SD video to ultra-high-definition video, from online shopping to 5G slow live broadcast, from listening to famous teachers remotely at home to controlling home appliances without being at home, AI guards the elderly who live alone...... In the past 30 years, new products, new formats, new scenarios, and new models of digital consumption have been emerging, and people's lives have changed the world.
In the field of production, China Telecom has built a 5G fully connected factory, innovated 5G + industrial Internet scenarios, stimulated new manufacturing momentum, and comprehensively built scenario-based private network solutions, launching 5G private network Zhiyuan mode, adjacent mode, and Ruyi mode to achieve "cloud-network integration, on-demand customization", enabling high-definition video, data acquisition CNC, unmanned inspection, dual-domain switching, As of 2023, China Telecom has accumulated more than 31,000 5G customized network industry application projects, and at present, China Telecom is actively promoting the 5G application "sailing" action plan, with the help of 5G, cloud computing, AI, AR and other technologies, through the construction of 5G capability Rubik's Cube system, large-scale rapid replication has been achieved, forming a series of typical cases such as smart mines, smart factories, smart cities, and smart medical care, releasing new momentum for the transformation of vertical industries.
In the field of security, China Telecom has built a service architecture with a security middle platform as the core by laying out a security capability pool and building a security infrastructure with a security middle platform as the core, forming a security infrastructure capability covering the edge end of the cloud network, and providing global threat detection, situational awareness and emergency response capabilities. Actively promote security products such as Security Brain, Cloud Embankment, and Quantum Cryptography, covering more than 10 industries such as government affairs, finance, education, and industry, serving tens of thousands of government and enterprise customers at home and abroad, effectively improving the overall level of Internet security protection in mainland China, and guarding the security of cyberspace.
Lay out the future
Accelerate the formation of new qualitative productivity
At present, the integrated development of space-air-ground communication network has become a key force to promote social progress, and the construction of space-ground integrated network is of great significance for improving network coverage capabilities, ensuring national security, and promoting economic development and social progress. China Telecom is continuing to promote the capacity building and application innovation of the space-ground integrated information network, and accelerate the capability layout of "Tianxing + Ground Network + Hub Port".
On the road of promoting the integrated communication network of space and earth, China's telecom industry pioneered the concept of "satellite as a service S+", actively promoted the test, verification and service pilot of satellite-ground integration and synaesthesia integration, and continuously made breakthroughs in key technologies in satellite network system operation. As a technical standard for mobile phones directly connected to broadband satellites, NR NTN (non-terrestrial network) is the direction of the future communication network space-air-ground integration evolution. Not long ago, China Telecom and its partners completed the world's first NR NTN service application pilot, realizing NR NTN's voice and broadband Internet communication for ferry passengers for the first time. Subsequently, China Telecom will work with industry partners to promote technological innovation and industrial process oriented to the integration of heaven and earth.
The next step of 6G will be to combine with satellite communication and satellite Internet to build an integrated space-ground network. For the 6G network, China Telecom has systematically carried out new network architecture innovations such as the "three-layer and four-sided" 6G service framework and space-ground integration, focusing on key core technologies such as near-domain cellular convergence (P-RAN) and air-space integration.
5G-Advanced (5G-A) commercial use is a necessary preparation for 6G, and China Telecom has carried out carrier aggregation deployment to promote the innovative application of cross-domain joint dispatching of time, frequency and airspace resources, and bring more technical efficiency to the development of new quality productivity. At present, China Telecom has built a UAV perception capability verification of 5G-A millimeter wave technology in Anhui, providing new momentum for the prosperity and development of the low-altitude economy.
In addition, China Telecom has also strengthened the research of key core technologies in the field of next-generation information and communication, and took the lead in coordinating the direction of "next-generation optical network" in the future industry, successfully achieving the experiment of 400Gbit/s and 1050km transmission distance of single wavelength, creating a world record for the real-time optical transmission capacity distance of single-mode optical fiber.
In the future, China Telecom will further increase its support for basic, forward-looking and innovative research on the next generation of Internet, carry out research on the integration and application of IPv6 with industrial Internet, Internet of Things, cloud computing, big data, artificial intelligence, etc., and work with the industry to continue to improve and optimize network capabilities, cooperate to build an IPv6 ecosystem, and promote the wide application of IPv6.
(Image source: Photo.com)
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