Where 5G allowed for vastly improved data speeds, lower latency, and more bandwidth, 6G wireless networks aim to make cellular the great enabler of functions like multi-sensory holodecks that plug into the metaverse. Whoosh. Terabits.
It is expected to have holographic communication, the Internet of Sensing, and massive digital twins that require substantial amounts of processing compute.
Hyper-connectivity
The rise of hyperconnectivity isn’t just a business trend; it entails developments in download speeds that create new opportunities and present new challenges that, in turn, demand new forms of adaptation on the part of companies.
These logistics chains are more efficient when they are connected: they can respond more quickly to disruptions, such as mechanical breakdowns, traffic jams and extreme weather; and they can become increasingly improved – learning-by-doing and learning-by-sharing – through the continuous feedback from data analysis in order to choose just-in-time, most likely optimised, routes for moving products.
For example, the much greater bandwidth, lower latency and higher capacity afforded by 6G networks will fuel consumption of more bits of information than ever before; power more devices to be connected at the same time (think virtual work meetings rivalled by your assistants’ newly improved multi-tasking AI); and promise us an ultra-connected lifestyle enhanced by many AI-powered personal assistants recommending everything in real time, thanks to integrated network slicing of resources, terahertz communications and more. Terahertz wireless communications solution. 6G is where future beckons an all-new global connectivity with consumer use-cases that we cannot even contemplate today or technologies that we have not yet conceived.
Immersive Experiences
Network slicing, one of 6G’s distinctive capabilities, is precisely this kind of flexible capability, which partitions physical infrastructure according to individual services or even specific industries. Logical connections can be created to provide users with low latency, high bandwidth connectivity at the level of individual applications, fulfilling specific specifications.
One further advantage of THz frequencies (terahertz, above 300 GHz) for 6G networks is the potential for additionally greater sensing sensitivity for wireless sensing and communication – as compared with lower frequency wireless (for example, Millimetre Waves such as 60 GHz Wi-Fi are envisioned in the 5G context) – along with other advantages such as deeper penetration through materials than with electromagnetic radiation (EM) and less susceptibility to external interference as well as causing less emissions due to external interference.
6G will provide AR/VR experiences with less delay than ever, including educational supports like holographic Mona Lisas pasted onto walls for exam preparation, or practicing surgical techniques with full-sized, three-dimensional replicas of human bodies.
Digital Twins of Everything
Digital twins are replicas of real-world objects with fidelity high enough to monitor and manipulate them in real time. You can watch, and sometimes take action, according to what happens in a car (or an aircraft or a tomato plant or a power station) in the real world. You can even deconstruct and then reconstruct them, all in order to read them more effectively. The potential applications are enormous.
This is where 6G technology will come in: because technologies such as Massive MIMO and beamforming will allow us to transmit data in more than one spatial dimension, and edge computing will reduce latency by processing it close to where it is generated.
Manufacturers can deploy Industry 4.0 technologies by adopting automated systems that have the ability to communicate and collaborate with each other, leading to multiple benefits, such as efficiency in operations and product quality, agile manufacturing and predictive maintenance.
Artificial Intelligence
Key technologies in AI are integral to 6G networks. Sensing and communication come from AI, whereas collective inference scales with the ‘one-to-many’ FindX launch methodology and interpretive algorithms based on processing at the edge and scaling to ‘many-to-many’ in the network core reduce costs. AI also helps networks to use resources efficiently and reduce costly infrastructure.
For this, 6G will provide very high-resolution virtual and augmented reality (MAR), creating full telepresence with high-bandwidth human sensory feedback, eventually obliterating distance as an impediment to interaction. Genuine applications could comprise product visualisation, holographic telemedicine, remote work and immersive games.
Underpinned by an invisible cloud, and linking cyber and physical worlds, 6G technology will support unbounded connectivity, enabling applications for digital twinning, immersive communication and tactile internet, as well as creating spaces for secure, trustworthy AI functions to harness the collaborative and innovative instincts of society at large. 6G will make things possible that have never been possible before. 6G will transform the world and help to build it into a truly collaborative, innovative, interdependent society.