This report provides an informative deep dive into all things 5G: its foundational technologies; how it will provide both a quantitative improvement in mobile performance (e.g., higher speeds and lower latency) and a qualitative expansion of use cases (e.g., industrial automation and smart cities); the need to promote not just deployment but also demand-driven adoption (think “killer apps”); the appropriate policies to facilitate continued American global leadership (e.g., spectrum clearing, improved access to rights-of-way, spending on R&D, and safeguarding standards-setting processes); and how best to address security concerns related to the supply chain.There has been much attention paid to this last topic. In particular, the Trump Administration, Congress, and the FCC all have raised alarms regarding Chinese telecommunications equipment manufacturer Huawei, the early leader in 5G hardware. Policymakers have concerns – relating, among other things, to espionage, network sabotage/shut-down, and consumer privacy –about operators incorporating into their networks purpose-built hardware (and enabling software) from a company with ties to the Chinese government. Unfortunately, at the moment there aren’t a lot of viable alternative vendors. Nokia, Ericsson, and Samsung are potential suppliers, but at this time they do not appear able to compete at scale.
That’s where Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) enters the picture. Broadly speaking, NFV does the hard work in software running on off-the-shelf servers. As Mr. Brake explains:
In the traditional mobile networking approach, the core network includes a variety of hardware appliances designed for specific functions…. [NFV] represents an important disruption of this system, wherein operators are transitioning to general-purpose servers and switches throughout the network instead of purpose-built hardware that must be individually installed and configured. The functionalities can then be provided in software….NFV can lead to lower costs, as off-the-shelf servers benefit from greater economies of scale than customized devices. More importantly, it has positive national security implications. NFV plays to the American tech sector’s proven strengths in software development, which notably can be accomplished at a relatively fast pace. Thus, rather than scrambling to play catch up on the hardware side, NFV creates an opportunity for U.S. companies to overcome, through a sustained commitment to rapid software innovation, whatever first-mover advantages Huawei may have gained.
The White House planned to host a 5G summit last month that would haven taken up the topic of NFV. Due to the novel cornonavirus, however, it was cancelled. Nevertheless, I expect the focus on software-driven solutions to increase steadily going forward.
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