South China’s Guangdong province has built over 110,000 5G base stations, with nearly 27 million 5G users, Chinese press reported, citing official statistics.
Ma Xingrui, governor of Guangdong, said that province has over 1,600 5G-related enterprises, accounting for about one-third of the national total.
In the first eight months of 2020, Chinese carriers had deployed a total of 61,625 5G base stations in Guangdong, which exceeded the provincial government’s target of adding 48,000 5G base stations for the full-year 2020.
Ma Xingrui added that Guangdong has an advantage in developing 5G, as the output value of communication networks and base station equipment in the province accounts for about 70% of the country’s total, while its smartphone shipments make up about 30% of the global total.
Shenzhen, a southern tech hub in Guangdong Province, reached full 5G coverage in August.
The city, with more than 12.5 million residents, is home to telecoms giant Huawei Technologies and other Chinese tech companies including ZTE and Tencent Holdings.
Meanwhile, Beijing’s authorities announced in September that the capital had become the second city in China to achieve full 5G coverage.
Shanghai has previously stated its commitment to investing CNY 10 billion ($1.4 billion) in 5G network construction this year, with the city anticipating 30,000 outdoor 5G base stations and 50,000 indoor small stations built by the end of 2020.
China has recently announced it has already installed nearly 700,000 5G base stations so far this year, exceeding the country’s original target of 500,000. According to China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) vice-minister Liu Liehong, this figure is more than twice the number of 5G base stations already installed outside China.
There are currently over 180 million devices operating on China’s 5G networks, the official revealed in his presentation at the China Development Forum, held in Beijing last month.
To achieve complete 5G coverage, China will need approximately 10 million 5G base stations in total, which will require a total investment of CNY 2 trillion (US$280 billion), according to Zhang Yunyong, president of the China Unicom Research Institute.
Huawei Technologies expects 5G users to account for 20% of total mobile users in China and South Korea by the end of June 2021, Ryan Ding, president of Huawei’s carrier business group, said during a presentation at the company’s Global Mobile Broad Forum in Shanghai, China.
The executive said that 5G adoption was happening faster than some of the initial predictions in China, with operator China Mobile now having 130 million 5G subscribers, ahead of its target of 100 million for the year.
