Indeed, Indonesia has not yet welcomed the 5G era

Five years ago, the Indonesian government had targeted the implementation of 5G networks in 2020. Now it has entered 2020, but this commercialization has not yet happened. In some countries, such as the United States and South Korea, 5G services are now on the air.

Let alone commercialization, there is no regulation yet. What the public knows is that the Ministry of Communication and Information (Kominfo) is currently still working on the regulations and their derivatives. 5G is estimated to launch five years from now.

One thing that is still being discussed is the frequency that will be used to implement the 5G network. The 700MHz band, which is predicted to be the key spectrum, has not been freed from analog TV. Meanwhile, the migration of analogue to digital TV will only be implemented in 2024.

By timeline, this plan sounds quite realistic. The reason is, the ecosystem to support development 5G technology in Indonesia there isn't any yet. In essence, there is still a very long way to get there.

The Minister of Communication and Information Johnny G. Plate even asked us not to rush to ask for 5G to be commercialized immediately. "TrialIt's just not finished yet," he was quoted as saying Seconds.

Do we need 5G already?

But maybe five years is not a long time in the era of global competition and massive technological developments. Not to mention talking about the Industrial revolution 4.0. If we let our guard down a little, we will be far behind--at least from the neighboring countries.

After all, 5G is no longer about how we can streaming without buffering or download movies without being left home all day. This fifth generation cellular technology can be game changer for human life, industry and the country's economy.

5G promises incredible speeds--though not yet proven--one of which is to transfer data at 800 Gbps. 5G can also handle thousands of devices and sensors simultaneously. So it's no wonder 5G is called the fastest telecommunications protocol.

The ones who will benefit most from the implementation of 5G are not data and cellular customers, but the industry. Moreover, the manufacturing sector is the main pillar of the country's economy.

Utilization Internet of Things (IoT), automation, big data up to analysis real-time in the manufacturing industry is said to increase productivity and efficiency greatly. Layers of business processes that are usually done manually can be fully automated.

Consulting firm AT Kearney, as quoted from Business times, predicts that the adoption of 5G will have a devastating impact on the industrial sector in Southeast Asia of US$147 billion by 2025.

Of this figure, US$81 billion will be contributed by the trade, transportation and finance industries. Then this value will increase by another US $ 59 billion if the manufacturing sector utilizes the Internet of Things (IoT).

Realistically, Indonesia doesn't need 5G yet. First, the distribution of our telecommunications infrastructure is still uneven. Internet penetration alone is not 100 percent. There are still many who are still using 2G phones.

Second, the supporting ecosystem, such as the assembly plant and its equipment, is not yet ready. If we really want to revive a domestic industry, we have to think about who will develop it--it is impossible to depend on foreign countries.

Third, we don't have any case examples or use case the right one to implement. So why bother with expensive implementations? switching The technology alone is expensive.

Not to mention about literacy and technology adoption. What should be concern--if the target is the industrial sector--is how they view the importance of implementing technology in business processes.

The government has not even been able to confirm when ideally 5G will be implemented in Indonesia. The Director General of Resources and Equipment for Post and Information Technology (SDPPI) Kominfo Ismail revealed that there are many technical issues that need to be discussed more deeply.

According to Ismail, the implementation of 5G is not only a matter of frequency availability, but also the readiness of the ecosystem and the monetization of the 5G infrastructure being built. "So at this time we are still focusing on testing with the operators," he said DailySocial.

Explosion of data consumption

As stated earlier, 5G is an investment to compete in the global market. We don't need to repeat when 3G entered Indonesia and it took more than 10 years to push its penetration.

Ecosystem development as a first step deserves to be a priority for the government if it wants to remain consistent with the vision the digital economy. And the industrial sector can be involved to encourage the growth of the digital economy, not only startups and corporations.

On the other hand, the urgency to implement 5G is increasingly inevitable given that internet data consumption in Indonesia continues to increase. With a population of more than 250 million, a data explosion could occur in line with the increasingly massive trend of using video-based services.

In an era where mobile content is the prima donna, hundreds of millions of people streaming video and music at the same time. The increase in data consumption that is still said to be able to disrupt the increasingly dense spectrum band.

This was agreed by the General Chairperson Indonesian IoT Association Teguh Prasetya when highlighting the urgency of implementing 5G. According to him, user requests for applications that require bandwidth high, low latency and high speed will increase in the next three years. This is not only in residential areas, but also industrial areas and big cities.

Another thing that is highlighted is the readiness of the related ecosystem, starting from device providers, networks, applications, and content. This readiness is related to the investment side, both in terms of capital expenditures, operational costs and human resources.

Therefore, continued Teguh, the government needs to consider the growth of domestic supporting ecosystems, starting from technology providers, system integrators, communities and domestic producers who can play a role in the development of 5G in the country.

"Judging from the three things above, at this time of course our concentration and main priority is dissemination broadband to all levels of society in Indonesia by optimizing the existing 4G technology on the side as well fixed broadband others," he said.

Optimization use case

Meanwhile, MDI Ventures Head of Investor Relations & Capital Raising Kenneth Li highlighted the importance of use case appropriate for the implementation of 5G. It emphasizes creation use case which is not easily replaced by 4G or its predecessor technology.

For example, activity streaming. 3G technology was developed to be able to run streaming, whereas 2G technology hardly does this.

However, in the context of IoT development, he assesses that there are still many developer which adheres to the concept of product development whose technology can be substituted.

"They are still applying the concept of 'best with 5G but works over 4G or 3G'. Because if they only think about creating technology that can be used by 5G, then market penetration will be very slow," Kenneth said DailySocial.

The concept above which according to him is considered to be able to slow down the growth of 5G, especially use caseit is related to IoT. Therefore, he emphasizes on developing use case in accordance with the use of technology at that time.

"With more and more primary use case as before, in the future [development] use case] I think it will be good," he added.