Technology – Give Me 5

5G is just one of the game-changing tech trends that we will see emerge in 2020, says Matt Pluckrose

We all know that technology is a fast paced industry with lots of new innovations frequently being launched, but it seems to have taken an age for 5G to finally arrive. However, it appears 2020 may be the breakthrough year.

3G broke down lots of barriers to enable pure remote access and streaming to be enjoyed by many of us and helped facilitate a boom period for smart phones and tablets. 4G has been perhaps less impressive with many users not noticing the difference, despite all of the publicity and rather patchy coverage too, so what can we expect from 5G?

Bye bye Wi-fi

The long-awaited roll-out of 5G in 2020 will bring unimaginable new levels of connectivity to help businesses thrive in a data-driven era and along with never-seen-before data capacity, we’re told 5G networks will offer incredibly high speeds and high capacity. “5G will enable a fully-mobile and connected society, unleashing human and technological possibility and fuelling business and financial opportunity,” according to Asha Keddy, vice president – technology, systems architecture & client group, Intel. So why does this matter? Well 5G will begin to eradicate any remaining barriers to mobile technology.

The speed, capacity and costs of roaming will change forever and whereas currently many of us still seek the refuge of a Wi-fi zone for connecting in any meaningful way, this will soon be a thing of the past. With more universal access, the boom in mobile working and utilising our phones and tablets for entertaining and working will continue at pace. From our perspective,

we expect to see an increase in trends for home and mobile working and with it an. increase in demand for related accessories.

Head in the clouds

Wireless headphones for blocking out peripheral noise as well as connecting to devices are always popular and will continue to grow as people use them for listening to music on the move, making calls and even participating in conference calls. Portable power and charge cables to keep our devices fully charged will become essential to power our mobile lifestyles.

Wireless power, like wireless audio, will be more and more attractive for the convenience that it provides and with ever faster speeds, and more compatible devices, we anticipate that it will become the default option over the next couple of years.

Eco incentives are now commonplace in the promotional world and the market is embracing this trend with vigour and this will heighten in 2020. Products designed with the environment in mind and packaging, carbon footprint and improved supply chain processes will become more the norm over the coming year or two. 2020 is a very exciting time for game-changing technology and this will open up large opportunities for our market as consumers and marketers look for on-trend products with a technology twist.

Matt Pluckrose is managing director of Desktop Ideas

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