Since the Trump administration imposed sanctions on China's Huawei, the mobile communications industry has 

always been concerned about the survival of global unified standards. Although 5G currently maintains global

 interoperability (iPhones purchased in London can be used normally in New York or Beijing), as the risk of 

technological decoupling between China and the United States increases, the 6G standard faces a crisis of division.

3GPP: Technology diplomacy in the war

It is expected to be five years before 6G is commercially available, and the mobile communications standardization

 organization 3GPP is still a "safe zone" in the struggle among all parties. Huawei, as China's largest 5G equipment

 manufacturer, has been banned in North America and some Eurasian countries, but its representatives still 

participate in 3GPP meetings with competitors such as Ericsson and Nokia. The Prague meeting on June 9 achieved 

important results - all parties agreed on the final version of 5G, Release 20. Juan Montojo, vice president of 

Qualcomm Technology Standards, believes that this shows the resilience of 3GPP in geopolitical turmoil.

"All parties involved believe in the value of a single global standard," Montojo stressed to Light Reading, 

"I have not found any exceptions." Adrian Scrase, former chief technology officer of the European standards

 organization ETSI, warned that a repeat of the standard split in the 2G era would have "catastrophic consequences."

Patent game and rule evolution

China's rapid increase in the share of core 5G patents has caused concerns. According to Eva Dou, author of 

"House of Huawei", Huawei once joined Chinese companies to fight Qualcomm's key 5G technology proposals. 

But Montojo pointed out that the new 3GPP rules have restricted a single regional representative from leading 

the agenda, and multinational companies must divide regional affiliations according to the location of their 

headquarters.

The current 5G leaders are likely to continue to lead the development of 6G. LexisNexis data shows that 

Huawei ranks first in the number of 5G patents, while Qualcomm's patent value score is the highest. Montojo 

predicts that the 6G patent landscape will be similar to that of 5G: "No surprise, it's still the same old faces."

Technology continuity and economic accounts

6G will most likely be an evolution of 5G rather than a revolution. This is good for Qualcomm, which relies 

on orthogonal frequency division multiplexing (OFDM) technology patent licensing - the technology accounts

 for the "vast majority" of its licensing revenue, contributing 14% of revenue and 39% of pre-tax profit last year. 

Ericsson explicitly supports the use of OFDM in 6G, and analysts believe that Huawei also prefers this solution.

Montojo explained: "Operators strongly hope to maintain the OFDM system to achieve a smooth migration 

from 5G to 6G." He revealed that through algorithm optimization, OFDM spectrum efficiency can be improved 

by 40%-60% compared with existing 5G, accelerating the upgrade of low- and medium-frequency bands to 6G.

High-frequency band challenges and core network lessons

For the high-frequency bands reserved for 6G (above 6GHz), the problem of poor signal penetration will be 

solved by increasing the number of antennas. Montojo said the number of components in 6G active antenna 

systems will be four times that of current 5G, but analysts worry that high costs may affect commercial feasibility.

The industry also hopes to avoid repeating the mistakes of the 5G core network - most operators grafted the 

5G new air interface onto the 4G core network for rapid commercialization, resulting in slow progress in 

independent networking. "Ideally, the 6G air interface will be directly connected to the 6G core network," 

Montojo said, "Operators hope that the 6G core network will be compatible with 5G, but the specific extent 

remains to be defined."

Risk of division remains

Montojo affirmed in his blog that Release 20 laid the foundation for 6G, but warned that government 

intervention could still undermine the results. If manufacturers are restricted to regional markets with very 

different needs, the motivation to participate in global standard setting will be weakened. At this moment, 

five years before the countdown to 6G commercialization, maintaining the unity of 3GPP, the "United Nations" 

of technology, is more challenging than ever.