• In our recent Industry Vision survey, we asked whether the telecom sector is doing enough to prepare for 6G
• There is growing concern that the industry is lagging in its efforts

Is the telecom industry doing enough to prepare for 6G? It’s a question that certainly divides opinion, as we found out when we once again posed it to the members of TelecomTV’s DSP Leaders Council earlier this year as part of our annual Industry Vision survey.

We also found a growing level of anxiety among the members of the council – a 100-plus strong body of industry leaders comprising senior executives from network operators, cloud service providers, technology developers and the analyst community – that perhaps the industry isn’t doing as much as it should to prepare for 6G.

The survey was conducted during January 2026 – ahead of the MWC26 show in Barcelona – and the results have been published in the free-to-download 2026 version of the DSP Leaders Industry Vision Report. 

As the graphic above shows, a solid 40% of our DSP Leaders Council survey respondents believe current levels of 6G R&D and planning are adequate and appropriate, almost exactly the same as the 38% that voted for the same option in the 2025 survey. So far, so consistent. 

But 30% believe the industry is already lagging behind in terms of its 6G efforts – and that’s up significantly from last year’s 19%. 

Now, it’s fair to point out that there’s also still some scepticism about 6G, with 24% of our survey respondents believing the sector shouldn’t be wasting its time and resources on it. However, the proportion of naysayers is down considerably compared with last year’s 35%, so support for the anti-6G argument appears to be flagging. 

Anxiety that not enough is currently being done will have likely grown during (and after) MWC26. 

During the show, wireless tech giant Qualcomm announced a strategic collaboration initiative that aims to “accelerate the development and global deployment of 6G” and establish a “clear, milestone-driven roadmap focused on delivering 6G commercial systems starting from 2029 onwards” – that’s one year ahead of the 2030 deadline by which the 3GPP expects to have 6G specifications completed. Qualcomm alone is a powerful voice in the mobile tech sector, but its initiative has broad industry support from big name network operators, such as Bharti Airtel, e&, KDDI, NTT Docomo, Reliance Jio, Telecom Italia and T-Mobile US, as well as the likes of Amazon, Cisco, Dell, HPE, Microsoft, NEC, Samsung and many more. 

Then, after the show, it emerged that the Trump administration is pressing wireless tech giant Qualcomm to develop and deliver pre-standards 6G chips in time for the summer Olympics, which will be held in Los Angeles in July 2028, two years ahead of the widely recognised 2030 deadline. In a recorded interview with Politico, Nate Tibbit, Qualcomm’s senior VP of global government affairs and public affairs, stated: “The US government is very interested in accelerating the timeline for 6G. They have asked us to work to bring 6G forward so that it will be launched in 2029 with pre-commercial devices ready to go for the 2028 Olympics in Los Angeles, so this timeline is accelerating pretty significantly and we want to make sure we have the spectrum and regulatory framework that allow us to deliver on that request.” 

Those timelines tie in with the Mission LA 2028 initiative launched a few months ago by the US National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA), which advises the president on communications, broadband and internet policy.

With things moving more quickly now in the 6G arena, it’ll be interesting to see how the survey results shift again in early 2027. 

Many other topics, including the telecom sector’s growth prospects, satellite direct-to-device (D2D) service timelines, ecosystem development, ‘fair share’ payments and the importance of various technical advances, are covered in the DSP Leaders Industry Vision Report.

We previously published an article on the survey results related to sovereign services and another article on the survey results related to telco security investments. The topics of security and sovereign AI infrastructure were also discussed during an Industry Vision panel discussion held on the MWC26 show floor in Barcelona.

For all of our free-to-download reports, check out TelecomTV’s reports section. 

- Ray Le Maistre, Editorial Director, TelecomTV