Connected Devices Are Here

India is taking the first steps to 5G, which offers data speeds that are 20 times faster and allows 100 times more devices to be connected compared to 4G. But the crucial difference between 4G and 5G is the 1/10th latency in data transmission or the time taken for a packet of data to reach from one point to another. Be it agriculture or automobiles, 5G is going to disrupt every industry.

- Dipesh Shah

Let’s go back to the future. Connected cars, drones flying in to help, surgeons operating on critical patients from thousands of kilometres away, flying machines helping to herd the sheep back home at dusk from your holiday shack, and appliances speaking to each other at home…

This is not impossible anymore. You could be experiencing all these soon, even in India, when Samsung undertakes the first 5G trials in New Delhi early 2019.

Fifth generation, or 5G, radio technology comes with some unique characteristics that make it by far the most advanced communications technology. It is far more efficient, allowing a lot more information to be transferred with the same amount of spectrum.

What makes 5G technology stand out are data speeds and bandwidth over the air, giving communications an altogether new perspective, allowing machines to talk to each other and even think for themselves. With 5G come data speeds that are 20 times faster and allows 100 times more devices to be connected compared to 4G. But the crucial difference between 4G and 5G is the 1/10th latency in data transmission or the time taken for a packet of data to reach from one point to another.

The potential uses are yet unimaginable given that now, at the very nascent stage of the implementation of the technology, it is already disrupting the way things have been done for centuries.

Take for example, its possible use in agriculture.

A recent report by the UN Food and Agriculture Organization says that farmers across the world will have to grow 70 per cent more food by 2050 to feed this population. While academics, economists and researchers are trying hard to find a solution, an interesting idea came up at Samsung during one of our meetings with the government – Smart Agriculture.