A total of 200 operators in 78 countries have already launched one or more 3GPP-compliant 5G services as of the end of December, according to the latest update from the Global mobile Suppliers Association (GSA).
Also, 487 operators in 145 countries were investing in 5G, including trials, acquisition of licenses, planning, network deployment and launches, up from 412 operators at the end of 2020.
GSA also reported that 187 operators in 72 countries have already launched 5G mobile services, while 83 operators in 45 countries had launched 3GPP-compliant 5G Fixed Wireless Access services (41.5% of those with launched 5G services).
The entity also noted that five operators had announced soft launches of their 5G networks that are not counted in the above launch figures.
GSA’s report also showed that 99 operators in 50 countries had been identified as investing in 5G Standalone (including those evaluating/testing, piloting, planning, deploying as well as those that had launched 5G SA networks). GSA had catalogued 20 operators in 16 countries as having deployed or launched 5G standalone in public networks.
GSA has also catalogued 1257 announced 5G devices, up by nearly 125% from 559 in a year.
GSA has identified 614 announced 5G phones, up more than 120% from 278 at the end of 2020.
There are at least 857 commercially available 5G devices, up more than 155% from 335 in a year.
In a previous report, GSA said that operators are increasingly experimenting with and deploying 5G standalone (SA) networks. “With a totally new, cloud-based, virtualised, microservices-based core infrastructure, some of the anticipated benefits of introducing 5G SA technologies include faster connection times, support for massive numbers of devices, programmable systems enabling faster and more agile creation of services and network slices, with improved support for SLA management within those slices, and the advent of voice-over new radio (VoNR),” GSA had said.
“Introduction of 5G SA is expected to facilitate simplification of architectures, improve security and reduce costs. 5G SA is expected to enable customization and open up new service and revenue opportunities tailored to enterprise, industrial and government customers.”
As of the end of October 2021, GSA had identified 94 operators in 48 countries worldwide that have been investing in public 5G SA networks.
“In addition to the investment in 5G SA for public mobile networks, a number of organizations are testing, piloting or deploying 5G SA technologies for private networks. GSA has developed a new database tracking private mobile network licenses, trials and deployments. It has collated information about 626 organizations known to be deploying LTE or 5G private mobile networks, or known to have been granted a license suitable for the deployment of a private LTE or 5G network so far. Of those, 151 are known to be using 5G networks for private mobile network pilots or deployments,” GSA said.
