HGC’s major yet unseen role in delivering 5G service to Hong Kong users

HGC is playing a major role in developing Hong Kong’s unfolding era of 5G mobile communications, while assisting the territory’s ambition to become a world-class smart city.

Running an extensive optical-fibre network places HGC at the centre of harnessing 5G and other technologies, such as artificial intelligence and the Internet of Things, to transform everyday life for Hong Kong citizens and businesses.

HGC helped mobile network operators connect their customers via 2G, 3G, 4G and 4.5G – and today plays an indispensable role in Hong Kong's 5G development.

Laying the foundation for 5G development locally

Each of Hong Kong’s main mobile players runs thousands of base stations all over the territory and all of them are connected to core network equipment and to the Internet world by HGC’s fibre network. In fact, HGC's local fiber network homepass reaches more than 90% of the population.

A vital yet unseen element of mobile service is the terrestrial “backhaul” network. This connects handset signals received by base stations to all the land-based equipment and Internet access required to make today’s highly-sophisticated mobile experience possible. HGC provides backhaul for most of Hong Kong’s leading mobile service providers, gaining a leading addressable market share.

Kelvin Yip, General Manager of Local Carrier Business, HGC expressed, “The extraordinary capabilities of 5G technology have required HGC to uplift its backhaul service. For example, 5G speed is calculated at around 10 to 20 times faster than 4G, so HGC’s fibre-based connectivity between base stations and landbased operations has been upgraded from 1GBps to 10GBps – which could be imagined as a much “fatter pipe” through which to carry communications and content."

HGC’s involvement in Hong Kong’s migration to 5G began some years ago when it joined with mobile operators to plan where their base stations – which create “cells” of coverage – should be located throughout the territory. They had to be installed close to HGC’s fibre network to minimise the time taken between a signal leaving a mobile handset and the response in terms of data or voice. This is known as latency – and the lower, the better!

5G features and applications

Main 5G features are high speed, low latency and ultra-high density of connections. HGC optimises super low latency made possible by 5G because its fibre network boasts round-trip latency of less than 2 milliseconds. This means the time taken for a packet of data to complete a round trip on HGC’s backhaul network is under two-thousandths of a second.

This is the kind of ultra-low latency required by the myriad lifestyle-enhancing and mission-critical applications emerging from 5G technology such as autonomous driving, remote robotic surgery and immersive mobile gaming to name just a few.

Businesses of all types are expected to benefit from 5G, which has been described as the key to unlock the fourth industrial revolution known as “Industry 4.0”. In fact, this new technology is expected to enable creation of products never before imagined.

The 5G era will give rise to a complex technology ecosystem to serve virtually every aspect of everyday life and leave 4G technology in the shade. For example, average 4G download speed experienced by users is around 25Mbps, compared with 5G’s 400Mbps. And 5G can support about 1 million devices per square kilometre compared with 4G’s 4,000.

Meanwhile, Hong Kong’s Internet of Things (IoT) capability – by which computing devices in everyday objects send/receive data – is enabled by HGC’s fibre connectivity between the many “small cells” required by IoT technology. These smaller-scale base stations of limited range also serve to provide high-quality mobile connectivity inside buildings, which 5G radio spectrum has difficulty penetrating.

Wi-Fi 6 offers an alternative to 5G connectivity

While 5G is the preferred choice for territory-wide mobility and applications, the new generation Wi-Fi 6 standard comes with similar technical specifications and offers a comparable capability, so provides another option for deployment of smart applications and IoT.

HGC delivers Wi-Fi 6 managed solution and managed services to organisations seeking to establish high-quality, yet cost-effective, wireless access network connectivity integrated with various enterprise management tools. The digital era enables companies from any industry to expand and capture opportunities by connecting mission-critical IoT devices and applications via a wireless access network. This is especially important when running public Internet access and industrial IoT operations in enclosed or specific areas of a diverse environment. Wi-Fi 6 delivers far more capacity and supports many more simultaneous users and devices than any previous generation of Wi-Fi technology. It can be used in conjunction with the latest generation of smart devices, sensors, access points and routers – as well as customized software and applications – to create comprehensive IoT and other smart solutions.

A distinct advantage is Wi-Fi 6 operates in an unlicensed frequency band, thereby allowing an organisation quite some freedom in terms of designing, implementing and even owning an entire solution. As a fully-fledged telecoms operator offering one-stop infrastructure-based ICT solutions, HGC believes 5G and Wi-Fi 6 complement one another to create wireless access networks suitable to satisfy a vastness of requirements in diverse circumstances.

HGC is embracing 5G wholeheartedly in order to help Hong Kong reap maximum benefit from the technology.

The article was first published on CAHK's Official Guide to ICT Industry in Hong Kong