5G IS COMING, IS IT ANY GOOD? Article By Baraka Godfrey Mollel

It looks like the world is not yet done with your experience with the internet and technology, it seems like every day there is something new out there for you. Whether it’s a new app, new gadget, or even a flying car. Everyone is mad with the internet and technology.

It’s not a bad thing but a good thing, at least in my opinion. Well hold your breath there is a new thing out there they can’t wait to roll it out for you to use it. 5G, yes I know another G thing.

Some of you might not even get into 4G yet even so called 3.5G and 4G. And they are planning for another G thing too. It’s called 5G, and it got so much potential and many fabulous features too. Including downloading a two hours film in just under two seconds, according to mark Zuckerberg CEO of Facebook and Samsung America CEO, one among the biggest and successful social media-network and a mobile company out there.

Well to be clear, 5G it’s not yet out. It is in development and trial phase right now but by 2020-25 you'll be having a whole new different experience with your phone, PC, Desktop even your wearable tech.

So What Does 5G Mean?

The “G” in 5G stands for “generation.” Wireless phone technology technically started with 1G, and in the early 1990s, and it expanded to 2G.Ultimately the world moved in to 3G, which gave people the ability to make phone calls, send text messages, and browse the internet. 4G enhanced many of the capabilities that were made possible with the third generation of wireless. People could browse the web, send text messages, and make phone calls—and they could even download and upload large video files without any issues.

What are the benefits of 5G?

Well like its predecessors 5G will have a lot of benefits to all kinds of sectors around the world, but in a nutshell let me give you a glimpse.

Download a movie in three seconds
Have every device in your home connected, including things like your fridge and other appliances. Maybe you might not come across this term ‘Internet of Things’, The Internet of Things includes things like wearables, smart home appliances, connected cars and more. Part of the goal behind 5G is to provide capacity for billions of all connected and upcoming connected devices to run smoothly and also to be able to assign bandwidth depending on the needs of the application and user.
Allow doctors to guide each other through a remote-surgery procedure
Let a jazz band play together remotely, creating real music in real time
According to re/code, Ultra-low latency: “Latency” refers to the time it takes one device to send a packet of data to another device. Currently with 4G, the latency rate is around 50 milliseconds, but 5G will reduce that to about one millisecond. This will be particularly important for industrial applications and driverless cars.
And more to come

And how about Africa?

Well currently in Africa most of us still use 2G,3G and very few have experience 4G. Many of telecommunication companies and technology companies like Facebook and Google are still trying to connect people into the internet. According to the World Bank, Approximately 160 million people across the busiest transport route in East and Central Africa, the Northern Corridor, don’t have access to the internet and some have estimated that only 9.8% of the entire African population have internet access. The effects can be felt across all areas of society, from the online resources children in classrooms don’t have access to, to the e-commerce opportunities African small businesses are missing out on.

There is no doubt that many companies are trying hard to bring the continent online, for example the highly ambitious Facebook project to bring the entire world online using solar powered internet beaming drones.

Aquila, Facebook’s Internet-delivery drone, has the wingspan of a Boeing 737 passenger jet, weighs less than 1,000 pounds, and can stay aloft for several months at a time.

Just to be fair, in Africa we have been the last in new technologies but the impact of new technologies in the continent has been tremendous. Just take a look at Mobile banking and its impact in the continent, especially in East Africa where the coming of mobile banking has been beneficial to the regional economy for the last seven years.

Mobile money in the developing world. Kenya got an early start with mobile money—its M-pesa service launched in 2007—which is one reason the country is a leader in this area.

The fact is that broadband connectivity is now closely linked to GDP growth and many urban and rural communities in Africa would benefit from a boost in affordable broadband internet connectivity. Affordable broadband internet connectivity will in turn result in improved education, health, banking, agriculture, service sectors and attract investment for business and industrialization of the region.

My views is that it will take time till the continent is fully exposed to 5G, but that doesn’t mean you will not have it, for those at least in the more developed parts of the continent such as in urban cities will have some of those benefits and in rural areas it will be more of a slow progress but it will bring many social and economic benefits to them especially in agriculture. In concluding I think, it is in the best interest of telecommunication companies in Africa and world big technology companies like Google and Facebook to embark is various projects and endeavors because the benefits are huge to both parties.