On the morning of January 12, Academician Wu Hequan of the Chinese Academy of Engineering stated in his keynote speech at the '2020 Technology Influencers Summit' that the pandemic accelerated the maturity and demand for 5G in 2020; in 2021, 5G positioning accuracy will improve to 0.3 meters, enabling enhanced applications in autonomous driving, port container handling, and indoor positioning.
Wu Hequan noted that China’s 5G laboratory officially launched commercial operations on October 31, 2019; however, large-scale deployment of commercial 5G networks did not begin until 2020. That year, China successfully contained the COVID-19 outbreak, and the pandemic spurred heightened demand for 5G. Meanwhile, China’s ‘New Infrastructure’ strategy accelerated 5G deployment, propelling the nation directly into the Standalone (SA) network architecture phase. Wu emphasized that although 5G is a wireless technology, its characteristics—high bandwidth, low latency, massive connectivity, and high reliability—enable seamless integration with next-generation information technologies including cloud computing, the Internet of Things (IoT), big data, artificial intelligence (AI), blockchain, and industrial internet. This integration bridges the entire data lifecycle—from acquisition, transmission, storage, processing, analysis, to decision-making—thereby unlocking data’s full potential as a production factor. At the same time, Wu stressed that 5G’s key performance metrics have yet to truly manifest in practical applications. Looking ahead, 5G’s superior capabilities will foster new digital and intelligent transformation business models and drive deeper convergence between informatization and industrialization.
Last updated: 2026-03-08