In February 2020, ETSI (European Telecommunications Standards Institute) announced the establishment of the F5G (Fifth Generation Fixed Network) industry standards working group - ETSI ISG F5G, proposing an industry vision from "fiber to the home" to "optical connection of everything".
In the past four years, F5G has brought tremendous economic benefits to serve a wide range of industries and build a connection base for home digitalization, enterprise digitalization, and public service and social governance digitalization, which has become a global industry consensus.
On November 30, 2023, ETSI released the F5G Advanced Generation Definition. As an important milestone in the development of fixed network technology standards, the report formally defines the F5G Advanced intergenerational standard, the evolution path from F5G to F5G Advanced, and defines the six characteristics of F5G Advanced, and explains its drivers and key technologies.
Standing at this special point in time, let's review and look forward to the progress of F5G evolutionHow will F5G-Advanced evolve in the future?What are the research institutes, operators, and equipment vendors exploring F5-A practices?
part.1
F5G optical networks have become the cornerstone of the digital economy
ETSI released "The Fifth Generation Fixed Network (F5G): Bringing Fibre to Everywhere and Everything" in September 2020**F5G's fixed generational standard and the vision of Fnetlink quickly became the focus of heated discussions in the industry, and rapid development has been achieved from standards organizations to industry applications. By the end of 2023, there will be 104 members, more than 2,200 manuscripts have been submitted, 29 WIs have been established to conduct technical research, and more than 70 seminars have been held with peripheral organizations.
Globally, we find that fiber optic networks, as the cornerstone of the digital economy, have become a core strategy for the development of ICT infrastructure in many countries.
The European Union has launched its 2030 Digital Decade Plan Europe'S Digital Decade" and "VHCN Guidelines" to drive the construction of gigabit optical fiber networks in European countries from the aspects of policy, capital, and supervision. China's 14th Five-Year Plan clearly proposes to fully deploy gigabit fiber networks, accelerate gigabit city construction and 200G and 400G upgrades, and formulate a three-year action plan to ensure that the goals are achieved. In addition, more than 20 countries have released top-level plans for fiber broadband, such as "Giga Thailand" in Thailand, "Decent Life" in Egypt, "NBN 2025" in Morocco, and "Digital India" in India, to accelerate the deployment of fiber broadband and promote comprehensive digital transformation.
In the home sector, F5G meets the new demand for network and information services with its high bandwidth, low latency, and ubiquitous connectivity, and actively incubates new products, new applications, and new business formats to accelerate the matching of supply and demand to meet consumers' diverse information product needs.
In the industry field, F5G facilitates the digital transformation of thousands of industries with features such as environmental protection, simplified architecture, large bandwidth, deterministic and low latency, and security and reliability. Fiber optics move from the home to the campus, to the factory and to the machine. FTTO all-optical campuses are deployed in more than 15,000 education, healthcare, and financial institutionsFTTM all-optical industrial network has been innovatively applied in more than 100 coal mines for underground safety production, port ultra-remote control, and all-optical traffic intersections.
part.2
The F5G Advanced intergenerational standard was released, defining six characteristics
The development of F5G has achieved good results, and the arrival of F5G-Advanced is a matter of course. At the end of 2023, ETSI ISG F5G released the F5G Advanced Intergenerational Standard, which pointed out that the F5G-A intergenerational development goal is to enhance the original three characteristics of F5G: enhanced fixed broadband (EFBB), all-optical connectivity (FFC), and experience assurance (GRE), and add three new features: real-time resilient connection (RRL), optical perception and visualization (OSV), and green and agile all-optical network (GAO).
Figure 1 - Six characteristics and key technologies of F5G-Advanced
**: F5G Advanced Intergenerational Standard
The F5G Advanced Intergenerational Standard also describes the key enabling technologies for F5G Advanced, such as 400G 800G Convergence Bearer, FGOTN, OXC, 50G PON, 10G FTTR, FTTM (Fiber-to-the-Machine), Intelligent Optical Sensing, L4 Autonomous Network, etc. Compared with F5G, F5G-A provides 10 times the bandwidth, 10 times the fiber connection density, 10 times the energy efficiency, reliability from 5 9s to 6 9s, meter-level accurate sensing, sub-millisecond latency, and L4 autonomous network.
part.3
Continue technological innovation and prosper the F5G industry ecosystem
In 2023, not only will F5G-A make milestone progress in standards, but it will also attract all parties in the industry to deploy in advance. Global research institutions, operators, and equipment vendors are developing a significant role in F5G evolution technologies (F5G-A, F5.).5G) and solution innovation, both of which have invested a lot.
During MWC 2023, the Heinrich Hertz Institute (HHI) of Fraunhofer, a world-renowned research institution, launched the F5G OpenLab, which aims to collect ICT requirements and promote the application of Fibre-to-The-X technologies, solutions and standards in vertical industries.
As the next-generation PON technology defined by ITU-T, 50G PON can achieve 10Gbps everywhere and accelerate the construction of 10 Gigabit optical networks. During the 517 Telecom Day in 2023, China Mobile, China Telecom, and China Unicom successively released their 50G PON development visions.
In November 2023, China Unicom Beijing completed the verification of F5G-A 50G PON-based technologies and innovative applications, including technology and performance verification for 50G PON and 10G EPON coexistence scenarios in the live network environment, and verification of 10 Gigabit services for enterprises based on 50G PON.
In November 2023, China Mobile's collaborative partners successfully completed the world's first symmetrical 50G PON live network application demonstration in Jiangsu Mobile's live network in Nanjing.
In December 2023, China Telecom Shanghai announced that it was the first in the world to achieve 50G PON all-optical 10 Gigabit coverage for 1,000 households on the existing network, and solved the technical problem of smoothly upgrading from 10G EPON to 50G PON in practice, demonstrating the large-scale deployment and application of the live network.
As an important aspect of industry observation, many operators around the world have made precise efforts in 50G PON development guidelines, testing and verification, which fully demonstrates that the construction of 10 Gigabit optical networks is close at hand, the F5G-A related foundation is approaching the inflection point of development, and the transformation of gigabit optical networks into ubiquitous 10 Gigabit access is now.
In addition to 50G PON, operators are also gradually rolling out multi-scenario F5G-A technology innovation.
In October 2023, China Mobile Hangzhou created an intelligent 8K 3D live broadcast application based on F5G-A to provide ultra-high-definition 3D** intelligent management services for competition venues. This is in the year 5On the 17th International Telecommunication Day, China Mobile Hangzhou released the "Double 10 Gigabit City", another new milestone for China Mobile, and it is also the first verification of 8K 3D** backhaul scenarios based on 50G PON.
In October 2023, China Unicom Beijing announced that it had completed the world's first F5G-A "single-fiber 100T" live network verification, covering the most advanced technologies in the current optical transmission field, such as 800G, ultra-broadband C + ultra-wideband, and L.
Mobily, a well-known telecom operator in Saudi Arabia, announced that it will build an F5G-A all-optical target network to help Saudi Arabia realize its vision of a ubiquitous 10 Gigabit connected society.
In December 2023, China Mobile Yunnan announced the application of 5G Advanced and F5G Advanced ultra-wideband technologies, marking Yunnan as it officially entered the era of dual-10 Gigabit networks.
According to the author's understanding, F5G Advanced** is expected to start commercial use around 2025.
part.4
F5G is expected to be commercially available in 2025
ETSI has outlined the next evolution path for F5G. As of August 2023, ETSI ISG F5G has released Release 1 and Release 2 specifications, introducing F5G for home broadband, commercial buildings, parks, and industrial production through 32 application cases such as XR-based virtual reality, home broadband connection to multi-cloud, virtual**, next-generation digital twin or AI-based PON optical path diagnosis, high-quality private line, scenario-based broadband, and industrial optical network Intelligent manufacturing, mobile bearer and other scenarios and a series of related technical standards.
According to the F5G Advanced Intergenerational Standard, from 2023 to 2027, ETSI ISG F5G will focus on completing the standard development of F5G Advanced. These efforts will be implemented in three versions: Release 3, 4, and 5. The release of these versions will align with the standardization of F5G Advanced's main companion technologies, including 50G-PON, FGOTN, FGMTN, 400 800 Gbps, and Wi-Fi 7.
The development of F5G to F5G Advanced is an important leap forward in the fixed network field, expanding the fixed fiber network from mainly for home broadband and business customers to providing a variety of emerging services for thousands of industries, while ensuring green efficiency, excellent service quality and higher security, thereby creating greater social and economic value.
part.5
Observation: Accelerate the evolution of F5G-A to usher in an intelligent world
The strongest wisdom is the wisdom of the crowd, and the greatest force is the combined force. On the road to the development and growth of the fixed network industry, we look forward to the continuous joint efforts of industry organizations, operators, industry enterprises, and equipment manufacturers. In this way, we can continue to seize market opportunities in the digital wave, promote the improvement of consumer experience and the transformation and upgrading of thousands of industries, and jointly welcome the full arrival of the intelligent world.