GSMA: European 5G future at crossroads

Against a global average of 24%, 5G accounted for 30% of mobile connections in Europe at the end of 2024 – the equivalent to 200 million subscribers – and is set to become the dominant mobile technology on the continent by 2026.

Yet urgent policy reforms are required to drive a step-change in access to investment across the continent to keep 5G in Europe competitive globally, according to research from global mobile industry trade association, the GSMA.

The latest edition of the annual Mobile economy Europe report painted an overall optimistic picture for 5G, which already accounts for the majority of connections in Germany and Switzerland, with adoption rates in Denmark, Finland, Norway and the UK exceeding 40%. The GSMA believes that 5G will provide an additional €164bn boost to the overall economy by 2030, with 80% of the continent’s connections forecast to be 5G, compared with 4G’s 18%.

The report pinpointed particular promise in advanced technologies such as 5G Standalone (SA) and 5G-Advanced, which it said were gaining traction and could help to unlock new use cases and monetisation opportunities, taking advantage of applications such as network slicing.  

The GSMA noted that as of September 2024, 18 European operators had launched 5G SA services, including recent launches from EE in the UK and Free in France. In addition, it said 5G-Advanced is set to deliver new solutions for enterprises, enabling uplink and multicast services at improved latency, increasing accuracy for extended reality applications and improving the reliability of artificial intelligence (AI).

Yet despite all of this, the study warned that 5G adoption in Europe continues to lag behind other advanced regions such as North America, East Asia and the Gulf Cooperation Council states, where many operators are now shifting their attention to the next generation of networks. This, said the GSMA, meant urgent policy reforms were required to drive a step-change in access to investment across the continent to keep it competitive globally and maximise 5G’s potential.

In particular, the GSMA stressed that unless key regulatory challenges that restrict investment capacity in the European sector were resolved, the increased adoption of these technologies in Europe would progress more slowly. It added that digital infrastructure would be key to helping Europe sustain global competitiveness, laying the foundations for advanced technologies, but also supporting what it expected to be a three-fold rise in mobile data traffic by 2030.

The report also highlighted how European operators are at the forefront of AI and generative AI (GenAI) development, with over a third (36%) having widely deployed GenAI across multiple business areas. The report revealed recent applications covering network optimisation, security enhancement and customer service improvements from European operators including Deutsche Telekom, EE, Orange and Vodafone.

In a call to action, the GSMA said addressing Europe’s digital infrastructure needs is an important first step towards re-energising the European telecoms sector as an engine of competitiveness and prosperity. It said that the benefits of increased investments will not be restricted to the telecoms and technology sectors, but will be felt across every other sector and the report concluded by recommending action points to support policymakers at the European Commission in building a competitive, secure and sustainable ecosystem.

These include: completing the Digital Single Market to allow the mobile industry to develop and deploy services on a cross-border or pan-EU basis; implementing additional measures to ensure fairness in the internet value chain; initiating a review of the EU Merger Regulation and taking a more long-term view on investment and innovation effects; establishing a pro-investment and more predictable approach to EU spectrum policy; and supporting the sustainability efforts of mobile operators.

“Europe is at a crossroads in its development of the digital infrastructure that its businesses and citizens will need to succeed. It is concerning to see it falling further and further behind other large markets around the world,” said the GSMA’s chief regulatory officer, John Giusti, commenting on the study.

“The mobile industry brings more than €tn to Europe’s economy as well as millions of jobs, and its role as a key enabler of commerce, logistics and innovation needs to be prioritised and strengthened. Urgent action is needed from the European Commission and other authorities within the European Union to deliver the policy reforms that Europe’s digital economy needs to support strong, sustained network innovation and to re-establish a leadership position in the global technology marketplace by 2030.”