Taiwan’s 5G penetration rate is expected to reach 5 to 20 percent a year after telecoms launch commercial services, while consumer uptake would depend on the maturity of 5G industrial chains, Ericsson Taiwan Ltd (台灣愛立信) said.
Taiwan is among the nations introducing the high-speed wireless technology this year, but the availability of 5G-enabled devices, mostly smartphones, is still limited and prices are high, Ericsson Taiwan president Chafic Nassif told a news briefing in Taipei on Tuesday.
That would not compare to Taiwan’s rapid uptake of 4G, which in its first 12 months reached 20 percent penetration rate, the company said.
Nassif said he is positive about Taiwan’s migration to 5G, as more innovative applications would be available for average consumers, and enterprise users soon are to have more stable and secure Internet connectivity.
Taiwan’s major telecoms are to roll out 5G service in the second half of this year, with Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) likely to take the lead on Wednesday next week, followed by Far EasTone Telecommunications Co (遠傳電信) two days later.
Chunghwa Telecom has said that within a year of launch, its number of 5G subscribers would reach 1 million, accounting for less than 10 percent of its total mobile subscribers.
With more 5G networks to come online later this year, the number of 5G subscribers worldwide is forecast to hit 190 million by the end of this year, according to the Ericsson Mobility Report released earlier this month.
The number is to expand to 2.8 billion by 2025, up from the 2.6 billion it estimated in September last year, accounting for about 30 percent of all mobile subscriptions at that time, Ericsson forecast.
“This is mainly due to a faster uptake in China than previously expected,” the report said.
However, the COVID-19 pandemic has delayed 5G spectrum auctions in Europe and could lead to a slower uptake of subscriptions in the near term, it said.
The report showed that consumers see resilient networks as vital during the pandemic, with 83 percent of respondents saying that information and communications technology has largely helped them cope with lockdowns.
One-third of consumers plan to invest in 5G and better broadband networks in preparation for a potential second wave of outbreaks, the report said.
Still, 4G LTE would remain the dominant mobile access technology by subscription from this year to 2025, with subscriber numbers likely to peak in 2022 at 5.1 billion, it said.
NO VIRUS BLUES: A SEMI Taiwan official said that the virus does not slow down the global semiconductor industry’s investment in manufacturing equipment The production value of the nation’s semiconductor industry is expected to grow 16.7 percent this year from last year, outpacing the global industry’s 3.3 percent growth, industry association SEMI said yesterday. That would help Taiwan safeguard its second spot in the global semiconductor market with a production value of more than NT$3 trillion (US$102.73 billion), SEMI Taiwan president Terry Tsao (曹世綸) told a media briefing in Taipei for the Semicon Taiwan trade show beginning today. The global semiconductor industry’s production value is expected to increase to US$426 billion this year, SEMI said. In terms of semiconductor equipment investment, equipment billings from Taiwanese firms
Intel Corp has received licenses from US authorities to continue supplying certain products to Huawei Technologies Co (華為), a company spokesman said yesterday. Washington has been pushing governments around to world to squeeze out Huawei, saying that the telecom giant would hand data to Beijing for espionage. From Monday last week, new curbs have barred US companies from supplying or servicing Huawei. This week, the state-backed China Securities Journal reported that Intel had received permission to supply Huawei. China’s Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC, 中芯國際), which uses US-origin equipment to make chips for Huawei and other companies, last week confirmed that it had sought
INVEST IN TAIWAN: A metal components casting firm and the world’s largest maker of aluminum bicycle rims also obtained approvals to join the program Solar Applied Materials Technology Co (SOLAR, 光洋應用材料), a part of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) “green supply chain,” has pledged to invest NT$1 billion (US$34.1 million) to build a new plant at the Tainan Technology Industrial Park (台南科技工業區), the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. SOLAR has been collaborating with TSMC to extract precious metals from waste and reuse them as “sputtering target” material in high-end semiconductor manufacturing, a TSMC press release issued in May said. Established in 1978, SOLAR also offers key materials and integrated services to customers in the optoelectronics, information and communications technology, petrochemicals and consumer electronics industries,
Swancor Renewable Energy Co (上緯新能源) yesterday announced plans for a 4.4 gigawatt (GW) offshore wind project off Miaoli County as part of its commitment toward Taiwan’s energy transformation, the company said in a statement. The “Formosa 4” project includes three deep-water wind farms 18km to 20km off the coast, Swancor Renewable CEO Lucas Lin (林雍堯) said, adding that planning for the project began last year. A proposal for Formosa 4 was this week submitted to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the company said. Swancor Renewable jointly developed the Formosa 1 project, a 128 megawatt (MW) wind farm about 4km off Miaoli and the
RSS