Current Telecom Infrastructure Can't Sustain the Metaverse -Huawei Report

Olufemi Adeyemi 

While high-speed 5G networks are speeding up tech operations in Nigeria and around the world, the current telecommunications ecosystem is still not prepared to support metaverse technology that can be very demanding, according to Abhinav Purohit, the chief expert on business and strategy consulting for Huawei in the Middle East region.

The chief strategist for Huawei’s Middle East region stated that networks have throughput, rendering, and download speed issues that must be addressed.

Huawei, the Chinese telecom giant, believes that current telecom infrastructure is insufficient to meet the needs of the Metaverse, but that 5G and 6G networks may be.

The remarks came from Abhinav Purohit, Huawei’s Middle East region’s Chief Expert on Business & Strategy Consulting, who published a three-part blog series on the Metaverse sector’s potential and where telecom companies will fit into the picture on December 20.

Purohit defined the Metaverse as a “collective virtual shared space” that will “allow geographically distant participants to enjoy realistic, spatially-aware experiences that seamlessly blend virtual content in a user’s physical world.”

He also stated that the idea of an open Metaverse is closely related to the Web3 movement because built-in economies will be enabled by “digital currencies and non-fungible tokens (NFTs).”

Download speeds, streaming quality, mobile devices, and Metaverse hardware, among other things, will most likely require rapid improvements to enable a smoothly operating virtual sphere, he said.

Purohit stated that delivering a fully polished and immersive experience necessitates a slew of technological advancements, saying, “Delivering such an experience will necessitate innovations in fields such as hybrid local and remote real-time rendering, video compression, edge computing, and cross-layer visibility.”

He also believes that cellular standards, network optimizations, and reduced latency between devices and mobile networks will be required.

According to Purohit, the key issues currently impeding metaverse networks are latency (network responsiveness), symmetric bandwidth (the speed at which data transfers), and quality of experience (network throughput).

He concludes that “5G networks will dramatically improve bandwidth while reducing network contention and latency, while 6G will increase speeds by another order of magnitude.”

In comparison to a fixed wireless broadband scenario, 5G network speeds can reportedly reach 1,000 Megabytes per second (MBps). These speeds are significantly faster than the national average internet speed in the United States, which is 119.03 MBps, according to High Speed Internet data.

Looking beyond the Metaverse, it appears that there is a significant push to get 5G fully operational around the world, with data from the Global Mobile Suppliers Association (GSA) indicating that 501 operators in 153 countries and territories are investing in 5G by August 2022.

According to GSA data, 222 of those 501 operators have already launched 5G mobile services in 89 countries and territories. Given that 5G has yet to be fully rolled out and adopted as the global mobile standard, it remains to be seen whether it can support a fully scaled Metaverse.

December 22, 2022