Qualcomm’s senior director Ben Timmons predicted industrial IoT deployments will ramp across Europe over the next 18 months, driven by recent 5G launches, with German players emerging at the forefront.

Speaking to media in London today (24 September) Timmons claimed the global economic output of industrial 5G IoT will be worth $5 trillion by 2035 when implemented in industries including manufacturing, transport, construction, utilities, and mining, with Germany set to thrive.

“I think Germany will be the lead in this segment due to the vendors that are present there and the interest in the market to exploit 5G IoT. This is down to the way German players think, the interest and history they have in the industrial IoT environment. Lots of what we have trialed will come to life in the world of industry.”

Timmons’ comments come after German regulator Bundesnetzagentur announced it will begin allocating spectrum between 3.7GHz and 3.8GHz for local 5G networks in the back half of 2019. Local licences will then be distributed to meet the needs of industrial, small and medium-sized businesses.

Timmons backed up his claim by pointing to Germany’s large industrial sector, which he said has seen constant investment and innovations over the decades.

UK 5G progress hailed
Moving focus to the UK, Timmons highlighted challenges facing the country in tapping into the industrial IoT segment. “There are factories in the UK that use machinery that are work perfectly well but are 50 years old, and firms are resistant to replacing them. That presents the challenge to us – how do we integrate industrial IoT with 5G low latency to a 50-year-old printing press?”

Timmons, however, praised UK operators EE, Vodafone and Three in launching 5G services and making the UK a “crucible” for the new network standard.

“The UK is an interesting competitive environment. Compare the UK to Spain where only Vodafone has launched and its quite slow and not very evident in terms of marketing or progress.”