China granted 5G licenses to the country’s three major telecom operators and China Broadcasting Network Corp on Thursday, giving the green light for commercial deployment of the next-generation cellular network technology ahead of the 2020 target, reported Reuters.
State-owned carriers China Mobile, China Unicom and China Telecom , as well as state-owned broadcaster China Broadcasting Network Corporation Ltd, are the four licensees named by the government.
The approvals will likely trigger investment in the telecommunications sector which will benefit top vendors such as Huawei Technologies, as the Chinese network equipment provider faces a US blacklisting cutting the company off from its major chip suppliers, said Reuters.