5G focus for China’s Guangdong as manufacturing hub pledges to build 20 hi-tech industrial estates by 2022
- President Xi Jinping promised unprecedented spending on ‘new infrastructure’, including 5G networks, in response to the economic impact of the coronavirus
- Huizhou, one of the ‘outer ring’ cities in the Greater Bay Area development zone, will host seven of the new industrial estates
China’s manufacturing heartland of Guangdong province has pledged to build 20 industrial estates by 2022 for firms that develop new industrial and business applications using 5G technology.
According to the action plan released last week by the provincial industry and information department, the new estates will be developed into industrial clusters which would each aim to create products worth up to 100 billion yuan (US$14 billion), the government-run Nanfang Daily reported, without specifying a timescale.
The 20 industrial estates will be built on both the east and west banks of the Pearl River, and will each cover an area up to 4,000 hectares (9,884 acres), the report said, although the government’s planned investment in the project was not disclosed.
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The seven new sites in Huizhou will target the development of artificial intelligence, new materials, smart health applications, and 5G-related products and services, the newspaper said, with the government set to invest up to 2.5 billion yuan (US$357,000) in each project.
Simon Zhao, associate dean of Beijing Normal University & Hong Kong Baptist University United International College division of humanities and social sciences, said it would not be easy for such cities to attract enough capital and talent to turn the plan into reality without a long-term economic boom in the Greater Bay Area.
Even Guangdong, China’s most developed province and largest economic engine, is under huge fiscal and employment pressure due to the sharp deterioration in economic conditions created by the coronavirus
“Even Guangdong, China’s most developed province and largest economic engine, is under huge fiscal and employment pressure due to the sharp deterioration in economic conditions created by the coronavirus,” he added.
Beijing has made the roll-out of China’s 5G network a national priority, given that the faster data transfer speed is expected to revolutionise industrial processes as well as the daily life of the general public.
With peak data transmission speeds up to 100 times faster than current 4G networks, 5G is seen as “the connective tissue” for the Internet of Things, including autonomous vehicles, smart cities and homes, virtual reality entertainment and communications, and other new mobile applications, creating the backbone for a new industrial internet.
More than 20 provinces across China have released instructions or action plans to promote 5G development since the country began to issue commercial licences in 2019.
So far, over 54,000 5G base stations have been installed in Guangdong, with the figure expected to rise to 100,000 by the end of the year, according to the provincial communications administration.
