In 2019, the UK saw its first 5G signals go live with promises of faster speed, lower latency, and a myriad of new IoT device use cases. Now, nearly five years later, DIGIT looks at the state of 5G in Scotland, if it was all worth it, and where it’s going. 

Compared to 56 other developing 5G markets, the UK is sitting 39th in terms of time mobile phone users are connected to dedicated 5G networks at 10.1%, according to OpenSignal, despite being one of the first countries to implement the technology commercially. 

The United States, which launched 5G around the same time as the UK, and has 40 times more land mass, has the fourth best connectivity percentage at 31.1%, trailing Kuwait (39.4%), South Korea (42.9%), and Puerto Rico (48.4%).

Compared to other countries’ 5G download speeds, the UK ranked 21st out of 25 according to Ookla. The UK’s year-over-year (YoY) performance between 2021 and 2022 dropped 38.26 Mbps (megabits per second) to an average of 129.14 Mbps download speed. In 2023, the average has once again dropped to 124.4 Mbps according to OpenSignal’s latest report.

“The UK is still not where it needs to be, but we are seeing that starting to progress,” said Paul Coffey, former chief executive at the Scotland 5G Centre and now CTO at Clarus Networks. 

Scotland in particular is facing unique challenges within this paradigm. It is home to over 60,000 residential properties unable to hit speeds of even 10 Mbps according to National Broadband, let alone a robust deployment of 5G.

Even with national efforts to equip hard to reach communities with gigabit-capable broadband, such as the £5 billion Project Gigabit programme, Scotland has been largely overlooked for easier-to-reach or more cost effective places in the UK. 

What’s the hold up?

A large part of the difficulty involved with transitioning to 5G is not just the remoteness of the areas in need, but as Coffey puts it, the underlying business model and value chain. He adds, “5G is cited to be the cornerstone of our digital economy, where widespread adoption of 5G could see £159 billion in productivity benefits by 2035. However, there are a number of challenges needing to be addressed to realise this.

“Despite the focus on rollout, there is still uncertain demand and ROI for 5G enabled services and use cases. Many of the economic benefits linked to advanced digital connectivity requiring high through-put, lower latency (immediacy) services are from smart factories, smart construction, logistics/warehousing and the energy sector, where they will require a dedicated mobile private network solution.  These private networks will arguably contribute more to transforming the UK economy than the overarching 5G public coverage,” he said.

Coffey believes it is still important to underpin the widespread adoption of 5G, but there is a need for further support and integration of ‘neutral host operators’ to collaborate with mobile network operators with the objective of sharing, and they are well positioned to support in more challenging environments.

Using a single site solution that covers all operators is a tried and tested model for 4G coverage and this same model can also be used to address rural deployment of 5G – where the neutral host operator leads on the deployment and integrates a number of use cases and customers who all contribute towards the business case.  

Coffey adds “This can be made up of public authorities, mobile operators and private sector organisations, all with slightly different needs but can all use the network coverage and capacity. There is a need for urgent regulatory changes to enable this model.”

However, a ramp up in deployments may not be worth the cost, according to Maarten Ectors, founder of Profit Growing Innovator and formerly working with Nokia Networks, as well as Vodafone and DT as a contractor.

According to Ectors, a large reason for the explosive growth of previous network upgrades were transformative innovations such as video streaming or mobile apps.  

“A lot of the business cases around 5G were things like robo-taxis, advanced IoT, and metaverses, and none of these things really have massively made a dent in adoption,” he said. 

In addition to the “it factor” for 5G end users not being present, Ectors also points to the cost of the actual rollout being another mitigating factor. 

“There’s no longer queues in the Apple Stores whenever there’s a new iPhone,” he said. According to Counterpoint, US smartphone shipments fell 23% YoY due to the current economic uncertainty. Ectors also noted, “There’s no more innovation in mobile phones that people have to get a new one.”

“That’s the demand side. Cost wise, all the rollout plans for 5G were made when inflation and interest rates were close to zero,” he said. 

“So the cost now to service all that debt is really, really high. As such, you’ll see a lot of consolidation, even bankruptcies in the telecoms that haven’t predicted such high inflation in their cost modelling —  and are seeing hyper competition which brings down the prices, which combined with high interest basically makes their debt really expensive.”

Is it still worth it?

However, experts at organisations like the Scotland 5G Centre suggest that 5G is best suited for business use-cases. 

Luca Campanalonga, technical business development manager at the Scotland 5G Centre says he’s seeing increased interest in adopting these networks for small to big enterprises, regardless of inflation. 

“This is because when we think about the wider benefits of private 5G networks, I think that they would compensate, if not overcome the effects of inflation,” he said.

“That’s why you have to look at the medium term and the long term, not just the short term. Of course, the development of use cases, installation and servicing of Private 5G networks needs the right expertise and consultancy, to help businesses adopt them.”

On top of the cost benefits over time, 5G also offers advanced security which pays for itself over time, with regards to the cyber-crime landscape. 

“5G has built in security algorithms,” says Campanalonga. “The different network components are interconnected by new security protocols. So this can guarantee a company improves the ownership of the service to the users. Then, of course, there are more secure apps that can be developed on the 5G market itself.”

Despite the high cost and complication involved in rolling out 5G, the fact remains that the technology could herald new levels of productivity for both enterprises and organisations.

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Looking ahead

Low Earth orbit (LEO) satellites have been utilised in the rollout of faster networks in more remote or hard to reach areas. 

“Looking at rural areas in Scotland, for instance, putting fibre into places like the Highlands and Islands is really expensive. So if the population is really low in those areas, using Starlink, and other low flying satellite networks is actually a good enough option,” said Ectors. “Yes, you might not get to the speeds you get in big cities, but between zero and 50 to 100Mbps, that’s a big difference, and it’s good enough for most people.”

Clarus Networks, which specialises in wireless connectivity solutions including building mobile coverage, used LEO satellites to connect the remote island of Papa Stour off the west coast of Shetland. 

“It’s a game changer for not just the community that resides there, but also for tourism on the island,” said Coffey. 

“We’re seeing a lot of fibre rollout going on at the moment, but it’s costly. If you can put money aside, it is the best solution, but there’s always a budget that needs to be considered here,” he said. 

“So I think, in these communities or locations, we need to now start considering how we can adopt other technology, whether that’s a satellite solution, or other means of wireless technology. 

“Low Earth orbit satellite has really been a game changer and is, I’d say, shaking up the industry. It’s a cost effective solution, providing good usable bandwidth, as well as low latency to enable a lot of applications and services to be built upon that.”