The rotating chairman of Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, Eric Xu Zhiju, has teased a new book published by his company that says 6G will be ready by 2030.
This is not a particularly risky prediction, as new wireless generations tend to emerge at the start of every decade. Rather, it gives the impression that Huawei (and by extension China) is setting a marker for the rest of the world on 6G. He actually says “we will continue as planned with 6G whether the rest of the world cooperates or not.”
“Huawei will define 5.5G and research 6G at the same time over the next few years, and it’s a test of the imagination and creativity of the entire industry if 6G can outperform technology (technologies 5G and 5.5G), ”Xu said. Huawei’s online community by Chinese government-controlled news site Global Times. Google Translate was not up to the challenge, so we will only have to hope the translation is accurate.
Tellingly, the Global Times article then goes on to talk about the great job Huawei has done to manage whatever the United States has thrown at it. “The US ban has harmed Huawei’s business to some extent, but has not been able to fundamentally harm it,” “independent” analyst Xiang Ligang said in the article. “Backed by the vast Chinese market, Huawei has managed to maintain its capital, staff and research capabilities, which I believe will enable the company to advance next-generation technologies and strengthen its lead. in the global telecommunications industry. “
There does not appear to have been any discussion of a standard split, but Xu stressed the danger of creating obstacles to global cooperation. “Whether industries can achieve satisfactory results (in the development of 6G) around 2030 depends largely on factors such as whether the process of defining 6G is sufficiently open, whether the participants are pluralistic and whether there is sufficient communication. thorough, “he said.
Veteran telecommunications expert Fu Liang, interviewed by the Global Times, was less reluctant. “If political tensions escalate, it’s also possible that 6G will have two sets of standards instead of one like in the past, but of course that will increase connectivity costs and result in losses for global businesses.” , did he declare.
One likely innovation in 6G will be basic radio wave technology, with Dr. Ronny Hadani, Scientific Director of Cohere Technologies, passionate about something called OTFS. “4G and 5G are both based on orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) waveforms,” he said in an emailed statement.
“However, 6G is going to require a waveform that offers better performance and supports extreme and high mobility scenarios – a problem identified by several standards bodies and forums. Subsequently, one of the first specifications Major aspects of 6G will probably be that it uses Orthogonal Time Frequency and Space (OTFS) as the basis for a new waveform. improved performance and spectral efficiency. This will enable a range of high mobility use cases already associated with 6G. “
That sounds good, although it should be noted that Cohere has been sniffing out this tech for some time. If we assume Hadani is correct, could there be more than one way to approach OTFS? Or will there be an equivalent of the space race, the first country to have it claim some sort of bragging rights over everyone? It almost seems inevitable that 6G will be the most politicized mobile standard yet, but perhaps it could also pull the United States and China from the brink of this new cold war.