5G in the Era of Geoeconomics : Playbook for Finland?

As compared to the earlier generations of mobile communications (1G to 4G), the fifth one (5G) is a major business, regulatory, and technical discontinuity. Furthermore, unlike the previous generations, 5G is also much more of a geopolitical and geoeconomic battleground. These shifts are neither well-understood nor fully reflected in public and private strategies.

This report opens the Mobile is Global (MiG) project of CKIR and ETLA that is kindly supported by Business Finland. The project assesses geoeconomic realities influencing future developments in mobile communications, offers a roadmap to lessen future uncertainties, and provides recommendations for paths forward for Finnish and European policymakers and industry.

In this report, we give a specific interpretation of Finnish national interests in the context of 5G and use this interpretation to derive a framework to think about geopolitically motivate internal and external threats and security issues. We also discuss the broader context for thinking about the future of mobile communications and delve into its technical and regulatory aspects.