5G is unlikely to make fibre redundant even when it becomes mainstream, according to the head of core network development at Deutsche Telekom.
Responding to the question of whether 5G will replace fibre – posed during a panel discussion at Total Telecom Congress in London – Franz Seiser said the two technologies were complementary and that consumers will not know the difference when connecting.
"The big misconception around 5G is that it is specific to mobile – this is not the case," he said. "5G has to be fully converged – consumers won't even recognise whether they are on a fixed or mobile connection – they will just know it is there."
In regards to fibre's role in 5G networks, Seiser went on to identify backhaul as the primary use case.
5G won't be disruptive to fibre networks, he insisted. "Even when the connection is primarily wireless, you still need to backhaul it and the more fibre you have, the more effectively you can do that.