Spectrum resources are the core resources for the development of mobile communications. Spectrum planning is the starting point of the industry and determines the industrial development pattern. Success stories include China Telecom's 800MHz and China Mobile's 900MHz network. According to industry insiders, the current preliminary plan for 5G spectrum allocation is that China Telecom and China Unicom will each obtain 100MHz spectrum resources of around 3.5GHz, and China Mobile will obtain 100MHz spectrum resources near 2.6GHz.
At the recent 2018 China International Intelligent Industry Expo, Wang Zhiqin, vice president of China's ICT, said that he plans to officially release the final licensing plan for 5G spectrum resources in September this year. At the same time, the allocation of frequency bands will not consider the auction model and will continue the assignment system.
Preliminary plan for 5G spectrum division
The Securities Times reporter learned from the industry insiders that the current preliminary plan for 5G spectrum allocation is that China Telecom and China Unicom will each obtain 100MHz spectrum resources of around 3.5GHz, and China Mobile will obtain 100MHz spectrum resources near 2.6GHz. In November last year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially released the 5G mid-band plan, using the 3300~3600MHz and 4800~5000MHz frequency bands as the working frequency bands of the 5G system. Among them, the 3300-3400MHz frequency band is used in the upper limit. China is also the first country to release a 5G mid-band plan.
In general, the deployment of 5G networks in the 3.5GHz band is more mature in the industry chain. Therefore, 3.5GHz is also the main battleground for domestic operators. The above-mentioned insiders said to reporters, "The industry of 3.5GHz is now more mature, but 2.6GHz is a blank, and China Mobile needs to develop." It is worth mentioning that in the previous mid-band planning, There is no mention of 2.6 GHz; however, what the reporter learned from another source also shows that the 2.6 GHz band will be added as the 5G operating band.
Spectrum determination influence geometry
It is very important to determine the 5G frequency division. The earlier it is determined, the more favorable it is for 5G development. For example, before the frequency is determined, the operator needs to test for different frequency bands, which will undoubtedly increase the input cost of the test phase. Once the 5G frequency division is determined, the important significance for the operator is to be able to basically understand how much the cost of networking will be. From a qualitative point of view, the ITW switch has a high cost and a low cost of building a low-spectrum network. As for the gap between the high and low, a carrier person told reporters that "there will be more differences."
Spectrum allocation and licensing has always been a weapon for regulators to adjust the balance of the mobile communications industry. In the 3G era, China Unicom was granted the most popular WCDMA license in the world. China Telecom and China Mobile were granted CDMA2000 and TD-SCDMA licenses respectively. Since the TD industry was not mature at the time, this decision profoundly affected the market structure of the 3G era. 2.6 GHz requires frequency cleaning, which may affect the network progress; however, the coverage of the 2.6 GHz band is better, so the number of China Mobile 5G base stations may be equal to or slightly higher than 4G when deployed.
China Mobile is already a market leader. If you get a low frequency like 2.6GHz, you will have a chance to crush your competitors in the future. Moreover, China Mobile has a large number of TD-LTE equipment at 2.6GHz (2575MHz~2635MHz), and it will have a speed advantage in 5G construction. In extreme cases, only the antenna feeder system and the main device need to be upgraded. Massive MIMO can greatly improve the 5G coverage capability, and can fully reuse the 4G site and supporting resources to obtain the advantage of rapid network deployment.
It seems to be a bit cheaper, but behind these costs is the price. From a global perspective, the 2.6GHz industry chain is very immature. The immature industrial chain means high cost, and consumers have fewer choices, which may repeat the mistakes of TD-SCDMA.
From this perspective, among the three major operators, China Mobile has the financial resources and the ability to shoulder the heavy responsibility of cultivating the industrial chain. In contrast, Telecom and China Unicom have received 3.5GHz, which looks like a high frequency (compared to 2.6GHz), but it is the most mainstream 5G frequency band in the world. It has a large scale and cost in terms of industrial chain robustness. Advantage. Once it is determined that Telecom Unicom adopts 3.5GHz and mobile uses 2.6GHz lower frequency scheme, in addition to bringing great changes to the construction of 5G networks of the three major operators, it will also be the main equipment vendors such as Huawei, ZTE, Ericsson, China Tower, etc. Infrastructure service providers have a huge impact.
At the recent 2018 China International Intelligent Industry Expo, Wang Zhiqin, vice president of China's ICT, said that he plans to officially release the final licensing plan for 5G spectrum resources in September this year. At the same time, the allocation of frequency bands will not consider the auction model and will continue the assignment system.
Preliminary plan for 5G spectrum division
The Securities Times reporter learned from the industry insiders that the current preliminary plan for 5G spectrum allocation is that China Telecom and China Unicom will each obtain 100MHz spectrum resources of around 3.5GHz, and China Mobile will obtain 100MHz spectrum resources near 2.6GHz. In November last year, the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology officially released the 5G mid-band plan, using the 3300~3600MHz and 4800~5000MHz frequency bands as the working frequency bands of the 5G system. Among them, the 3300-3400MHz frequency band is used in the upper limit. China is also the first country to release a 5G mid-band plan.
In general, the deployment of 5G networks in the 3.5GHz band is more mature in the industry chain. Therefore, 3.5GHz is also the main battleground for domestic operators. The above-mentioned insiders said to reporters, "The industry of 3.5GHz is now more mature, but 2.6GHz is a blank, and China Mobile needs to develop." It is worth mentioning that in the previous mid-band planning, There is no mention of 2.6 GHz; however, what the reporter learned from another source also shows that the 2.6 GHz band will be added as the 5G operating band.
According to the above preliminary plan, the three operators will get a total of 300MHz spectrum resources, which does not exactly match the spectrum resources included in the mid-band plan. In this regard, the above-mentioned insiders explained that the initial scheme allocated the macro station frequency band, the three operators each 100MHz, and the micro station deployment can be selected in multiple frequency bands such as 3.3GHz, 4.6GHz, 4.9GHz and millimeter wave. It is reported that the complexity of 5G networking will be greatly improved compared with previous generations of mobile communication technologies. In addition to the need to deploy traditional macro stations, it is necessary to compensate for the lack of coverage of macro stations in a few cases through micro-station and indoor base stations.
Spectrum determination influence geometry
It is very important to determine the 5G frequency division. The earlier it is determined, the more favorable it is for 5G development. For example, before the frequency is determined, the operator needs to test for different frequency bands, which will undoubtedly increase the input cost of the test phase. Once the 5G frequency division is determined, the important significance for the operator is to be able to basically understand how much the cost of networking will be. From a qualitative point of view, the ITW switch has a high cost and a low cost of building a low-spectrum network. As for the gap between the high and low, a carrier person told reporters that "there will be more differences."
Spectrum allocation and licensing has always been a weapon for regulators to adjust the balance of the mobile communications industry. In the 3G era, China Unicom was granted the most popular WCDMA license in the world. China Telecom and China Mobile were granted CDMA2000 and TD-SCDMA licenses respectively. Since the TD industry was not mature at the time, this decision profoundly affected the market structure of the 3G era. 2.6 GHz requires frequency cleaning, which may affect the network progress; however, the coverage of the 2.6 GHz band is better, so the number of China Mobile 5G base stations may be equal to or slightly higher than 4G when deployed.
China Mobile is already a market leader. If you get a low frequency like 2.6GHz, you will have a chance to crush your competitors in the future. Moreover, China Mobile has a large number of TD-LTE equipment at 2.6GHz (2575MHz~2635MHz), and it will have a speed advantage in 5G construction. In extreme cases, only the antenna feeder system and the main device need to be upgraded. Massive MIMO can greatly improve the 5G coverage capability, and can fully reuse the 4G site and supporting resources to obtain the advantage of rapid network deployment.
It seems to be a bit cheaper, but behind these costs is the price. From a global perspective, the 2.6GHz industry chain is very immature. The immature industrial chain means high cost, and consumers have fewer choices, which may repeat the mistakes of TD-SCDMA.
From this perspective, among the three major operators, China Mobile has the financial resources and the ability to shoulder the heavy responsibility of cultivating the industrial chain. In contrast, Telecom and China Unicom have received 3.5GHz, which looks like a high frequency (compared to 2.6GHz), but it is the most mainstream 5G frequency band in the world. It has a large scale and cost in terms of industrial chain robustness. Advantage. Once it is determined that Telecom Unicom adopts 3.5GHz and mobile uses 2.6GHz lower frequency scheme, in addition to bringing great changes to the construction of 5G networks of the three major operators, it will also be the main equipment vendors such as Huawei, ZTE, Ericsson, China Tower, etc. Infrastructure service providers have a huge impact.
