Earlier this year at the Mobile World Congress, tech companies revealed demonstrations of how the new 5G technology will work in the future. Recently, Qualcomm unveiled the company's very first 5G modem called Snapdragon X50.

Qualcomm claims that its 5G-capable Snapdragon X50 has theoretical download speeds of up to 5Gbps. This is a significant improvement to the current 4G LTE connectivity which can barely reach the one-gigabit threshold.

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The most interesting part of Qualcomm's announcement is that the Snapdragon X50 could be at the heart of devices released within the first half of 2018. Many experts agree with Qualcomm's timeline as 5G standards are expected to be finalized within the year. With this, network providers like Verizon and AT&T will need test devices soon, especially since the technology will be using the 28GHz mmWave band.

Qualcomm said that the Snapdragon X50 would essentially be used for the early adoption of 5G technology, according to Engadget. This could mean that the X50 will most likely be released as an experimental roll out to develop a more efficient hardware that can handle 5G speeds.

Qualcomm said that it was able to achieve the 5Gbps download speed threshold by using the 800 MHz bandwidth in the mmWave spectrum. While many experts have criticized this frequency due to its limited penetration range, some experts suggest the use of MIMO antenna technology to bounce signals off walls. Despite the positive developments of the new 5G technology, experts believe that it will be years before the technology will be fully implemented for the general public to use.

TagsQualcomm, qualcomm 5g modem, 5G Networks, 5G download speed, 5G LTE, 5G Network, 5G standard, Snapdragon, Snapdragon X50