Chongqing leads western China in 5G development

Chongqing heads the pack in western China in the creation of a dual-gigabit city, as three of its districts recently became gigabit cities.

A gigabit city is one in which all average urban households have access to gigabit fiber network coverage, and where there are 22.2 5G base stations per 10,000 people, higher than the national average of 15.7 and in which over 80 percent of large public hospitals, key universities, major cultural and tourist sites, trunk airports and key roads have access to 5G, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.

A gigabit connection is typically delivered over fiber optic lines and offers speeds of up to 1,000 Mbps, or 1 Gigabit per second.

By the end of October, 110 cities qualified as gigabit cities, and accounted for about one-third of all prefecture-level cities, according to the ministry.

Forty-one gigabit cities are located in eastern China, 29 in central China, and 40 in the west, including Chongqing's Yubei, Jiangbei districts and Chongqing Liangjiang New Area.

Chongqing municipality, which is home to 34 million people, is a historical industrial center.

The city has promoted the construction of 5G networks and other new infrastructure in recent years while facilitating integration between 5G and industries such as manufacturing and logistics.

It has launched 20 demonstration projects featuring "5G plus industrial internet," which are applied to remote control and intelligent logistics among other scenarios.

To date, there are 19 5G base stations per 10,000 people in Chongqing, which is leading 5G development in western China, according to the municipal economic and information commission.

In Liangjiang New Area, China's first inland national-level new area, there are 70.98 5G base stations per 10,000 people and 42.19 percent of mobile phone users have 5G access.

"Liangjiang New Area will continue to promote 'double Gigabit' network construction, application innovation and industrial development, expand the network into areas such as education and medicine, as well as encourage innovation in telecommunications, internet companies, car networking and smart manufacturing," said Lu Hua, deputy director of the Development Strategy Bureau of Liangjiang New Area.

Chongqing has installed some 70,000 5G base stations and plans to install 150,000 by 2025, enabling the in-depth penetration of 5G in industry, logistics and energy.