With the 4G era of innovation in our rearview mirrors, I was expecting to see and hear a lot more discussion from mobile operators about the status of their 5G application development. After all, it’s been three years since the launch of 5G in the U.S. and nearly half of all U.S. subscribers own a 5G phone. But when it comes to ground-breaking services enabled by 5G, I find it difficult to name one – beyond just faster connectivity.
That’s why I’m surprised we’re not hearing more about the types of 5G applications that are being developed at wireless operator innovation centers around the country. We know these innovation centers still exist but there seems to be little discussion about what is actually happening behind the scenes at these centers.
During the 4G era, AT&T executives spoke frequently about the work happening at its Foundry innovation centers. The company opened its first Foundry in Plano, Texas, in March 2011 and then opened others in Palo Alto, California; Atlanta; and Ra'anana, Israel. These innovation centers were very involved in developing 4G connected car and connected healthcare applications.
Of course, the idea for AT&T’s innovation centers came from John Donovan, who joined AT&T in 2008 as its chief technology officer. Donovan, who’s background was in tech, not telecom, worked hard to transform the company into more of a collaborative environment where startups and tech companies were welcomed for their ideas. Donovan retired from AT&T in 2019 and more recently, Andre Fuetsch, EVP and CTO of network services at AT&T, who worked under the leadership of Donovan for several years, announced that he will retire in September. Igal Elbaz is now AT&T’s chief network officer and will lead AT&T Labs and Jeremy Legg will become CTO.
But analysts insist that these leadership changes don’t necessarily indicate that AT&T is stepping away from its existing strategy. “I think you will continue to see innovation,” said Roger Entner, founder of Recon Analytics. “Igal [Elbaz] has a real-world understanding of fiber and connectivity.”
AT&T has said that it is now using its Foundries for 5G development but it hasn’t provided many more details about specific applications that are being developed or hinted at what ground-breaking 5G applications are on the way.
Verizon also opened a number of innovation centers for 4G development and it appears to have replaced those with its 5G Labs in Washington, D.C.; Waltham, Mass.; Los Angeles and Palo Alto, Calif.
Interestingly, T-Mobile, which didn’t have big splashy 4G innovation centers, is now opening 5G centers. The company has a 5G Open Innovation Lab in Seattle where it selects a group of companies every spring and fall to participate in a 12-week program and they work on different applications using its 5G network. In addition, the company in March opened a 24,000-square foot 5G Hub near its headquarters in Bellevue, Wash., where it lets developers test 5G technology and work closely with T-Mobile engineers.
However, the hype around these innovation centers is definitely not as strong. Entner said that operators are less vocal because many of the applications are centered around industrial and enterprise use cases. “Innovation is happening but it’s more practical innovation,” Entner said.
In addition, many of the enterprise and industrial partners that operators are working with on 5G use cases do not necessarily want a lot of publicity.
“There was a lot more publicizing of the 4G applications because they were very consumer focused and easier to talk about,” said Chetan Sharma, CEO of Chetan Sharma Consulting. In particular, much of 4G was focused on video and managing video consumption, which was something that 4G networks could handle that 3G networks could not.
However, while video is an important component to 5G, many of the applications being discussed are more enterprise-oriented. “The nature of 5G is different,” Sharma said.
Nevertheless, Sharma believes we will start to hear more about 5G use cases in the coming months, particularly as operators like Verizon and AT&T make progress with their C-band 5G deployments.
I think the industry needs to hear more about 5G use cases and some of the ground-breaking applications that are being developed at these innovation centers. 5G is starting to look like a whole lot of hype with little reality. It's time to change that perception.