5G and IoT will dominate Telecom sector and drive talent demand in 2021

Today, in the telecom sector, 5G and IoT are playing an instrumental role in expanding Telcos services and abilities over a wide range of verticals. Together, they are unleashing a powerful combination of super speed, expanded bandwidth, low latency, and increased power efficiency that shall drive billions of more connections in the coming years. Not only that, but 5G enabled IoT also promises to generate and sustain millions of jobs around the world.

The 5G Factor

Thanks to features like speed, massive capacity and super low latency, the 5G technologies are set to bring wide disruption in the IoT powered industries. According to IDC, by 2021 5G's broad enablement of IoT use cases will drive 70% of G2000 companies to spend US$1.2 billion on connectivity management solutions. Though 5G is still in a preliminary stage, its technical capabilities offer plenty of reason for excitement. Apart from addressing connectivity issues and providing increased network coverage, 5G will allow technological innovations in network slicing, edge computing, AI, and machine learning processes delivered to the end-consumer. Edge computing will be possible due to ultra-low latency via Multi-Access Edge Compute (MEC), which moves workload processing to the edge. This will further drive major revenue from enterprise use cases.

5G will also enable people to control devices remotely in applications where real-time network performance is a must.

While, COVID-19 pandemic forced verticals to embrace digital, 5G coupled with IoT can lead to a data-rich environment. With latency of approx., two milliseconds between devices, 5G also promises to boost remote applications to new heights. These applications range from remote control of heavy machinery to remote surgery, thanks to a proliferation of IoT devices. Steve Szabo, Vice President, wireless, IoT, and partnerships at telecommunications provider Verizon Business, says that 5G also bring high throughput. "We have seen in trials with vendors up to 4Gbps at peak speeds, which can give you a feel for what 5G is capable of," Szabo says, with the potential to reach 10Gbps.

Moreover, 5G connections are highly reliable. Tests show that 5G can support one million connected devices per square kilometer – 10 times more than possible with LTE. Thus, it can open new possibilities in smart cities and smart building capabilities of the future. This is quintessentially why, telecom vendors are looking to optimize processes and streamline workflows for more efficient and effective operations.

IoT to Dominate Telecom Sector

As telecom players are well-positioned to be one of the biggest players in IoT, it will also be an important part of Industry 4.0. Under Industry 4.0, Telecom companies can promote the development of IoT services across all major industries, particularly Energy and Resources, Transportation, Manufacturing, Agriculture, Government, Healthcare, and Retail. Powered by user-centric architecture of 5G, Telecom will rely on IoT sensors for data collection, asset tracking, and service delivery; and, at the same time, expand the IoT infrastructure. Meanwhile, the accelerated rollout of 5G base stations, will continue to build an increasingly connected society. In other words, 5G has become an integral force in the development of IoT technology and implementation in the telecom sector.

As the market is structuring very quickly around smart industry, telecom industry will see 5G presenting enormous opportunities in the future. This will also mean, IoT will be poised to unleash transformational services that will usher humanity into the next digital era. With the explosive growth in data generation, globally, IoT will take center stage in telecom sector. Additionally, harnessing this data, will create job opportunities in the telecom industry too.

According to a market analysis by staffing firm TeamLease Digital, the talent demand in India's telecom sector is expected to grow by 18-20% in 2021 on account of wide-spread adoption of internet services, demand for better telecom networks, and the rollout of 5G technology. The analysis reports that some of the most sought job profiles will be RF engineers, fiber laying, testers, quality check engineers, field engineers and more.