Industries revolutionised by smart wireless technologies
Author : Joanna Leach | Marketing Executive | Nomad Digital
01 June 2022
Nomad Digital_Industries revolutionised by smart wireless technologies
When thinking about rapid developments in wireless technologies, it's easy to automatically jump to telecommunications. However, as Joanna Leach, Marketing Executive at smart wireless connectivity provider to the transportation sector, Nomad Digital tells us here, with so many alternative industries taking advantage of wireless technologies & connectivity, this couldn’t be further from the truth…
A version of this article was originally featured in the June 2022 issue of EPDT magazine [read the digital issue]. And sign up to receive your own copy each month.
Many companies quickly recognised the need for intelligent wireless technologies and the importance of the likes of the cloud space back in late March 2020, following the announcement of the first nationwide lockdown in response to the coronavirus pandemic. A report by Ofcom showed that 94% of businesses believe digital technologies are crucial to increasing their productivity too. With this in mind, businesses who had failed to prepare with said technologies were left rueing, finding it difficult to quickly mobilise their business and staff, while firms who were better prepared navigated the transition effortlessly.
The question is, how much of an impact have wireless technologies and connectivity had on individual industries? Here, we will take a look at some of the industries revolutionised by smart wireless technologies – and the impact that 5G will have on their future.
Energy
Connectivity in the energy industry “helps augment the critical role that the industry has in the economy, increasing asset efficiency and reducing costs”.
Thanks to the power of wireless technologies and connectivity, the energy industry as a whole has been able to transition from a predictive system to a real-time reporting alternative. Now, as opposed to depending on unreliable predictions, and basing conclusions on previous events, the energy industry is able to balance both supply and demand in harmony, maintain critical infrastructure, and harness technology to educate and inform consumers.
The result is one of positivity for both the industry and the consumer, directly translating into greater reliability and lower costs for both.
5G communications, meanwhile, are expected to further transform the energy industry, vastly increasing download and upload speeds — up to 96% faster than those offered by 4G.
While fuelling the smart grid to improve forecasting is certainly one way in which technologies have impacted the energy industry, it has also been noted that 5G can work to rapidly develop technologies such as smarter automatic traffic lights — preventing significant energy waste.
Construction
Back in early 2020, a Chinese construction company (CSCEC) was the first construction site to implement 5G into their processes.
The site had already introduced smart technologies such as AI (artificial intelligence), big data and building information modelling (BIM); however, 5G connectivity has promised to provide site chiefs with the part of the puzzle they’ve been looking for.
5G is being used on-site to better enable data collection, ultimately improving a variety of aspects, including health & safety and process efficiency. For example, a member of staff could log on from the portacabin and check the status of a piece of machinery to see if it is in use before traipsing halfway across the construction site.
Caterpillar’s Customer Enterprise Digital Manager notes: “When a site can become connected, there are multiple benefits, including improved safety, reduced costs of materials, and increasing the availability of the workforce by making jobs easier to do.”
Healthcare
The internet of things (IoT) has already been working to transform the healthcare industry, collecting, recording and analysing data. It has also been allowing for the improvement of access to care, the improvement of quality of care, and a reduction in the cost of care.
Remote monitoring of patients means that treatment comes to them, rather than vice versa, and information regarding their welfare is shared through wireless connectivity to the relevant professional. Similarly, others can benefit from early intervention of preventative care, where a monitoring device is capable of tracking them and reporting on them — ideal for someone elderly who is more likely to suffer a fall at home.
In the wake of COVID-19, we can expect to see a number of further transformations in regard to digital technologies and the role they play in the healthcare industry.
Analysts have suggested that the use of telehealth will triple by 2025, and it will be powered by the capabilities of 5G. Meanwhile, superfast internet will also offer healthcare professionals the ability to send the likes of MRI scans online, with ease. This has been a particular problem thanks to the fact these files are usually around 1GB in size, making them challenging to share.
Transportation
Wireless technologies have, for a considerable amount of time, played a significant role in the developments which have occurred within the transport industry.
The creation of autonomous vehicles, such as Google’s Waymo self-driving car project and the establishment of smart roads that we’re starting to see pop up in the Scandinavian countries, have all been fuelled by the likes of AI, automation and a plethora of smart wireless technologies.
However, the introduction of 5G to the transport industry looks set to take things even further. 5G rail connectivity is being tested in a bid to develop a fully automated rail service, while car manufacturers across the globe are investing in similar concepts to allow vehicle-to-vehicle (V2V), vehicle-to-infrastructure (V2I) and vehicle-to-everything (V2X) communication to take off.
Summary
Herein, we’ve detailed some recent examples of industries that have been revolutionised thanks to smart wireless technologies, but following ongoing events, it won’t be a surprise to see a plethora of alternatives also implement complete overhauls by introducing similar processes and concepts. The UK government’s instruction to remove Huawei equipment from 5G networks by the end of 2027 could delay things significantly, however, with the entire 5G rollout and infrastructure impacted — we will simply have to wait and see!
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