How Intel is capitalising on 5G with new partnerships and product launches

To showcase its innovations in 5G, US chipmaker Intel has launched new products related to the communications technology at the 2019 Mobile World Congress.

The company also showcased the 10nm system-on-chip wireless access product, nicknamed Snow Ridge, which will enter the market by the end of 2019.

Sandra Rivera, senior vice president and general manager of the Network Platforms Group at Intel Corporation, said that Ericsson has adopted Intel’s Snow Ridge to evolve its 5G base station product lines.

“To deliver its 5G solutions, Ericsson is using Snow Ridge as a component along with its custom silicon to deliver RAN Compute solutions. We look forward to seeing more from Ericsson and other customers as we work with them on solution delivery,” said Rivera.

By 2035, 5G will become a $10-trillion market opportunity, Intel said in a statement. With data at its centre, which Intel looks to tap into, 5G will disrupt innovation in network infrastructure across all forms of controlled machines and smart devices, the statement added.

Intel stressed that it has been working with partners to leverage cloud platforms in an effort to build ‘intelligent edge’, a term to bring analytics, artificial intelligence, media processing and computing to end devices.

The move is expected to create a network of a new class of consumer and business services that were unreachable on previous architectures, the report said.

Intel also showcased its work with Rakuten, a Japanese electronic commerce and Internet company based in Tokyo, which is building their first virtualised cloud-native mobile network. Rivera also said that Rakuten chose Intel architecture to help speed up the wireless networks and capabilities.

“There will be more developments to come on this use case for a unified cloud-native infrastructure that can scale to meet the demands of almost any workload,” she added.

Intel also said that its new modems would play a significant role in moving 5G forward. In the areas of radio frequency (RF), front-end technology, the company has collaborated with Skyworks to create a front-end solution for the 5G Intel XMM 8160 modems.

Rivera also said that Intel will help leading gateway providers, who have adopted the Intel XMM modems, move to the new XMM 8160 5G modems by early 2020.