- Samsung and Hyundai serve up a RedCap 5G private network trial
- Hyundai is using RedCap to connect a vehicle inspection device
- Madden expects that 2025 will be a formative year for RedCap in the West
Could an up-and-coming Internet of Things (IoT) technology be the key to accelerating 5G standalone (5G SA) deployments? Perhaps so, one analyst told Fierce.
“RedCap has been commercially used in China for about six months already,” Mobile Experts lead analyst Joe Madden noted in an email. “But in the Western market, I would agree that 2025 will be a big year for commercial launches among multiple operators."
Reduced Capability (RedCap) IoT has been conceived as a digital industrialization IoT technology. It relies on 5G SA in order to deliver reduced data rates (around 1 Mbps) and use less power than 5G smartphones and other devices.
"It will initially be limited by the adoption of SA core networks, but as business grows RedCap could become one reason for operators to invest in an SA core," Madden continued.
If that's the case, things seem to be moving in the right direction. Samsung Electronics just wrapped the industry’s first end-to-end RedCap trial over a private 5G network with Hyundai Motor Company in South Korea.
The RedCap testing follows Samsung’s successful deployment of a private 5G network in Hyundai Motor’s major manufacturing facility last October.
For its deployment, Hyundai integrated RedCap-enabled Qualcomm chips into its its Diagnostic Scan (D Scan) module, which was connected to the Samsung private 5G network at its plant.
The idea is for Hyundai to use 5G RedCap and D Scan at its factories to automatically inspect and efficiently determine whether vehicles have been assembled correctly before releasing finished cars. Compared to the old Wi-Fi system, this system achieved a more seamless, real-time inspection data transmission during the trial.
But enterprises aren't the only ones making progress with RedCap. Operators are already rolling out their first RedCap devices. For example, T-Mobile launched the TCL LINKPORT IK511 5G connectivity device in October 2024.
Where will the road lead next? We'll be watching closely at Mobile World Congress next week.