During this year's MWC, Huawei launched the world's first 5G-A intelligent core network to support more cutting-edge applications. According to Huawei, 5G-A can improve network performance tenfold. For instance, it can support a downlink speed of 10 gigabits per second, compared with the current 5G speed of 1 Gbps.

Li Peng, senior vice-president of Huawei, said, "The combination of 5G-A, artificial intelligence and cloud computing will help nurture new growth drivers." Li added that the technology can help address challenges that 5G cannot solve in certain application scenarios before the commercialization of 6G.

Eager to tap into the huge potential, China Mobile, the world's largest telecom carrier in terms of mobile subscribers, announced at the tech show that it will start deploying 5G-A commercial networks in more than 300 Chinese cities this year, which would make its scale the largest in the world.

Yang Jie, chairman of China Mobile, said the company has made progress in experimenting with new 5G-A applications. For instance, more than 4 million users in China are now using a new calling service that can support automatic translation and other AI functions during ultra-high-definition video calls.

Xiang Ligang, director-general of the Information Consumption Alliance, a telecommunications industry association in China, said the progress comes amid the country's unparalleled edge in 5G.

China has built the world's largest 5G network, which had more than 800 million mobile subscribers at the end of 2023, according to the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology.