Huawei Technologies Co is well-positioned to pursue sustainable innovation in 5G thanks to its long-term spending in research and development, despite challenges, a company executive said.

Gan Bin, vice-president of Huawei's wireless network product line, said a leading product is the result of long-term technological accumulation, and the wireless network is not just about innovation on a single component, but about the overall system engineering, so the impacts of the US digital components are actually very small.

According to him, Huawei has long had advantages in 5G wireless network products, including 5G base stations, after sustained heavy investments into the wireless technology.

Gan made the comments at the sidelines of the 18th Huawei Global Analyst Summit which was held in Shenzhen earlier this week. At the summit, Huawei and China Mobile (Shanghai) Industrial Research Institute announced a white paper for 5G positioning titled Open Application Programming Interface (API) Industry.

Currently, the accelerating adoption of 5G worldwide further boosts the integration of 5G with a wide array of vertical applications, including smart manufacturing, smart ports, smart mines and smart energy. Among these applications, many location-based services play an important role during enterprise digital transformation. 5G positioning technologies provide better support for many industries in terms of enterprise management, security monitoring, emergency rescue, trip monitoring and the like. They also become the key driving force behind 5G innovation.

To strengthen platform interoperability, the white paper defines 5G network positioning APIs of different types and functions, which enable industry customers to access location services and improve collaboration between all parties on the 5G positioning industry chain. With these APIs, operators' 5G positioning platforms can facilitate positioning services such as map management, location alarm and track query, Huawei said.

The Chinese tech giant is working hard to scale up the application of 5G in a greater variety of sectors. In February, it launched a new 5G solution for businesses. Huawei said it has worked with operators, partners and enterprise users to first apply the 5G solution for businesses in the steel industry. With their capabilities and experience embedded into this platform, industrial 5G solutions like automated billet rotation, remote assembly assisted by augmented reality, and steel surface quality inspection, can be standardized and rapidly replicated.