Nokia CEO Sees ‘Staggered’ 5G Rollouts This Year, ‘Broader’ Ramp-Up in 2020

Nokia CEO Rajeev Suri has “absolutely no doubt" a "fast and meaningful shift to 5G is underway,” he said Thursday on a Q4 call. All signs say 2019 will be "very second-half-loaded” in the 5G transition because of the “staggered nature" of global 5G rollouts from region to region, he said. He expects “a broader ramp-up starting at the tail end of 2019 and in 2020,” he said. The 5G “ecosystem” is “in its early days,” so “development and testing are operating under considerable time pressure,” he said. Though there’s a “massive amount of 5G-ready hardware already deployed,” some of it “is waiting for the availability and acceptance of the key 5G software releases,” he said. “Those releases will come available as the year progresses.”