- Qualcomm said the Trump admin wants three commercial 6G devices for LA Olympics in 2028
- The Trump admin plans to launch 6G in 2029 commercially
- The standards bodies that develop 6G, however, are still planning a 2030 launch
Qualcomm said this morning that the Trump administration wants to deliver 6G earlier, in time for the Los Angeles Olympics in the summer of 2028.
Talking at a Politico “Powering 6G” event today, Qualcomm’s SVP of global government affairs and public affairs, Nate Tibbits, said that the “timeline is accelerating pretty significantly.”
“The U.S. government is very interested [in 6G], they have asked us to work so it will launch in 2029 with three commercial devices ready to go for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles,” Tibbits said.
Commentators and analysts have already said that the 2028 Olympics will be a significant proving ground for 6G. Having three commercial devices ready to go for the games appears to be a significant — and probably impossible — step-up in the timetable.
But the standards
The first 6G standards will not even arrive in time for the 2028 games, so exactly how vendors will deliver a “6G” device is unknown.
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) will start the process of submitting technologies for 6G IMT-2030 framework in 2027, and that process will run until the beginning of 2029. The ITU will then designate a technology as IMT-2030, which is estimated to be completed by 2030. Alongside that, the 3GPP is working on its first 6G standard, release 21, which is expected to be frozen because the IMT-2030 framework will be finished in 2030.
The bottom line is that any commercial device that arrives in time for the 2028 games won’t actually be 6G, since the standards won’t have actually been finalized. Rather, expect 5G devices with a 6G veneer and a Trumpian flair at the Olympics.