Recently, Minister of Industry and Information Technology Xiao Yaqing said that while developing 5G, the evolution direction and evolution technology route of the next-generation communication technology should be considered, and the development of the next-generation communication technology 6G should be planned and deployed in advance. In addition to China, the United States, Russia, Japan, and the European Union are all carrying out 6G research, and the 6G competition pattern is accelerating.

On November 3, 2019, the Ministry of Science and Technology of my country organized a 6G technology R&D kick-off meeting to officially start 6G R&D. The 14th Five-Year Plan for Digital Economy Development issued at the beginning of this year also proposed to make a forward-looking layout of the sixth-generation mobile communication (6G) network technology reserves, increase support for 6G technology research and development, and actively participate in the promotion of 6G international standardization. At the beginning of the year, Nanjing Zijinshan Laboratory released a major achievement of 6G－360-430GH THz 100Gbps real-time wireless transmission communication experimental system. THz wireless communication is recognized as the core technology of 6G, and its huge spectrum resources can support the communication speed of 1Tbps.

Internationally, in February 2020, the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) held the 34th ITU working group meeting, officially launched the research work for 2030 and the future (6G), and clarified the timetable early researched by ITU 6G before the end of 2023.

According to ATIS, 11 companies including Apple, Google and Microsoft in the United States announced the formation of the 6G Alliance in October 2020. Japanese tech giant NTT and Intel began developing 6G network technology in 2019. South Korea plans to invest 120 billion won in 6G research and development in 2022, and launch 14 6G communication satellites by 2030. The EU has launched a three-year 6G basic technology research project, the main task is to study the next-generation forward error correction coding technology, advanced channel coding and channel modulation technology that can be used in 6G communication networks.

  What can 6G bring?

At present, according to the known information, the speed of 6G can reach about 50 times that of 5G, so it can have more diverse application scenarios, requirements and challenges, wider coverage, and even air-to-ground connections. Higher speeds can be achieved Cross-border integration and intelligent connection of scenes, etc.

Han Xia, chief engineer of the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, said that in the future, 6G will greatly expand the capabilities and service boundaries of mobile communication networks, continue to deepen the application scope and fields of the Internet of Things, effectively serve intelligent production and life, and help build digital society.

Peng Mugen, executive director of the China Institute of Communications and executive dean of the School of Information and Communication Engineering, Beijing University of Posts and Telecommunications, said that 6G can not only bring users a more immersive and ultimate experience, but also meet the needs of human communication at multiple sensory, emotional and conscious levels. It can also be widely used in entertainment life, medical health, industrial production and other fields, helping the digital transformation and upgrading of various industries in our country, and meeting various application needs of the future intelligent society.

  Which key technologies need to be broken through?

The 14th Five-Year Plan Information and Communication Industry Development Plan recently released by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology proposes to carry out research and development of 6G basic theory and key technologies. In terms of key technology research, we will increase support for the research and development of network technologies such as optical communication, millimeter wave, 5G enhancement, 6G, and quantum communication, track research on open wireless network technology, and accelerate the industrialization and application promotion of communication network chips, devices, and facilities.

The 6G white paper Key Drivers and Research Challenges of 6G Wireless Intelligence Ubiquitous prepared by the world’s first 6G summit gives several key indicators for measuring 6G technology: the peak transmission speed reaches 100Gbps~1Tbps, while 5G is only 10Gpbs; The accuracy is 10 cm and 1 meter outdoors, which is 10 times higher than that of 5G; the communication delay is 0.1 millisecond, which is one tenth of 5G; ultra-high reliability, the interruption probability is less than one millionth; ultra-high density, the density of connected devices Over 100 per cubic meter. In addition, 6G will use the terahertz frequency band for communication, and the network capacity will be greatly improved.

In addition, dynamic spectrum sharing technology, intelligent meta-surface technology, cell-free massive MIMO technology, NOMA technology, etc. are also potential application directions in the development of 6G technology.