Future Technology Trends Outline The Need For 5G Networks

A decade from now, consumers all around the world will make greater use of 5G networks as they will move from the internet of things (IoT) to the “internet of senses.”

According to Swedish manufacturer Ericsson’s December study, entitled “10 Hot Consumer Trends 2030,” consumers expect that by 2030 it will be possible to interact with technology through their five senses.

The findings were presented to BNamericas and other reporters in Mexico City on Tuesday and they come from an online poll of 500 IT users aged from 15 to 69 in each of 15 of the biggest cities around the world, including Mexico City and São Paulo.

The criterion to select the participants was that they were users of either augmented reality (AR) or virtual reality (VR), or that they intended to make use of such technology in the future. Some 12,590 participants were contacted in total, of which 7,608 qualified.

Of the large number of trends suggested, the most popular five were related to human senses and the following five were linked to VR, online privacy, environmental sustainability and sensorial services.

Though the respondents did not specifically say they wanted to make use of their senses through technology, the investigators at the Ericsson Consumer Lab formulated the trends based on the responses.

“When a user tells you ‘I want the equipment to do what I’m thinking,’ you translate that into ‘your brain is the user interface,” Catalina Irurita Gomez, Ericsson’s marketing and communications VP for North Latin America, said at the presentation of the study at a lunch on Tuesday.

While the trends outline a path where technology becomes less of a metal gadget and more an extension of the human body, they also indicate concerns over cybersecurity and identity verification.

“In a world of avatars, being certified as a human being is going to be considered as an added value,” Irurita Gómez said, adding that consumers expect the issues of fake news and misleading or manipulative information to be resolved by 2030.

WHY ARE TRENDS IMPORTANT?

One of the reasons trends are analyzed is so they can provide the industry with a wide panorama of what consumers will demand in the future, Ericsson’s Daniela Dib said.

As experts have told BNamericas, the deployment of 5G networks requires users who are willing to pay for the services. The trend study indicates that Latin America shares similar technology interests to those around the world.

Technologies such as VR, AR and artificial intelligence (AI) work best with 5G networks, which Latin America is still struggling to launch.

“In Latin America, there is a risk that 5G and all its transformation and revolution is going to arrive a bit late compared to the United States or northwest Asia,” Ericsson’s CEO for North Latin America Elie Hanna said.

The head of the telecom Swedish manufacturer also said that Ericsson’s networks are compatible with 5G and that, when the switch occurs, they will be ready.

“All Ericsson 4G networks are ready to enable 5G with a software update. In other words, we won’t have to change anything, this deployment can be very fast. It’s closely related to the strategies that operators have,” he said. – Bnamericas