Leveraging 5G: Faster, more stable, and more secure wireless connectivity.

• Author: Barbour, Tracy
• Position: TELECOM & TECH

5G technology is having a significant impact at Spawn Ideas. The Anchorage-based advertising agency is operating in hybrid mode: employees work two days in the office and three days from home, with about one-third of them completely remote. Most of the company's thirty employees take advantage of 5G wireless service to communicate with colleagues and clients across Alaska, Washington, Montana, Iowa, Oregon, and Washington, DC.

The availability of 5G makes hybrid and remote work more feasible for Spawn Ideas. It enables employees to have ubiquitous and secure connectivity. For example, many use a mobile phone as a WiFi hotspot for their laptop when conducting Zoom calls or doing other business away from the office. With 5G, they can work wherever they are, which is a huge advantage--and luxury, according to President and CEO Karen King. "We are really spoiled by 5G's data transfer speeds," King says. "We're used to low latency. We're used to the stability and reliability of having a 5G [compatible] phone and service."

Spawn Ideas uses wireless service from GCI which, incidentally, is also a client of the agency. "Living in Anchorage, I feel that I have all of the advantages with service from GCI that anyone else has in other US locations," King says, referring to the speed and dependability of 5G cellular service.

The use of 5G technology has been steadily increasing among consumers and companies like Spawn Ideas. By 2025, 5G networks are expected to have more than 1.7 billion subscribers globally, according to Global System for Mobile Communications, which represents the interests of mobile network operators worldwide. Most cellular carriers began ramping up their efforts to deploy 5G a few years ago. At this stage, 4G is still relevant because 5G networks and devices rely on 4G to enhance performance.

5G, the fifth generation of wireless technology, is the technological upgrade to the 4G networks that connect most current cell phones. 5G technology uses shorter, higherfrequency bands of the radio spectrum to deliver greater load capacity, faster speeds, lower latency (delay in transmission), and improved flexibility. The actual speed and range of 5G cellular signals varies according to where frequencies fall within the spectrum. Since 5G can run on any frequency of the airwaves, it allows telecommunications companies to deliver different 5G experiences to their customers. 5G can be implemented in low band--which uses a frequency range...