5G Market Report 2025: Key Statistics & Innovations

This 5G market report provides a comprehensive overview of the industry’s current state, growth rates, employment trends, patent activity, innovation clusters, and investment patterns. We highlight key hubs, top investors, and emerging startups to offer insights into the strategic movements defining 5G development globally.

These data points, reflecting emerging innovations, investment landscapes, and changing customer demand, will equip industry leaders, C-level executives, and corporates with actionable intelligence to make informed decisions.

Executive Summary: 5G Market Outlook 2025

• Industry Growth Overview: With technologies like beamforming, small cells, and metamaterials propelling next-generation network developments, the 5G sector saw a yearly growth rate of 20.38%.
• Manpower & Employment Growth: Approximately 1.8 million people work in this sector, and 102 800 new employees were hired last year.
• Patents & Grants: With 25 625 applications, the industry filed 76 247 patents, increasing at a rate of 7.61% annually. Further, China leads in patent issuance, with 2110 grants promoting further research and innovation.
• Global Footprint: Major hubs include the USA, China, India, Germany, and the UK, while Shenzhen, London, Beijing, Shanghai, and Tokyo emerge as the top city ecosystems.
• Investment Landscape: With an average round size of USD 77 million, over 5603 funding rounds have been completed. 1486 businesses that are spearheading sector innovation have received funding from more than 5500 investors.
• Top Investors: The collective investment reached USD 14.48 billion, led by the European Investment Bank, Amazon, and NGP Capital, among others.
• Startup Ecosystem: Five innovative startups – Obvios (private 5G), Montsecure (network security), Infinite Wireless (SIM-free connectivity), iCana (radio frequency semiconductor chips), and Astellatech (open-radio access network (O-RAN) solution) showcase the sector’s global reach and entrepreneurial spirit.

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Methodology: How We Created This 5G Market Report

This report is based on proprietary data from our AI-powered StartUs Insights Discovery Platform, which tracks 7 million global companies, 20K+ technologies and trends as well as 150M patents, news articles, and market reports. This data includes detailed firmographic insights into approximately 7 million startups, scaleups, and tech companies. Leveraging this exhaustive database, we provide actionable insights for startup scouting, trend discovery, and technology landscaping.

For this report, we focused on the evolution of 5G over the past 5 years, utilizing our platform’s trend intelligence feature. Key data points analyzed include:

• Total Companies working in the sector
• News Coverage and Annual Growth
• Market Maturity and Patents
• Global Search Volume & Growth
• Funding Activity and Top Countries
• Subtrends within 5G

Our data is refreshed regularly, enabling trend comparisons for deeper insights into their relative impact and importance.

Additionally, we reviewed trusted external resources to supplement our findings with broader market data and predictions, ensuring a reliable and comprehensive overview of the 5G market.

What Data is Used to Create This 5G Market Report?

Based on data provided by the StartUs Insights Discovery Platform, we observe that the 5G market stands out in the following categories relative to the 20K+ technologies and trends we track.

These categories provide a comprehensive overview of the market’s key metrics and inform the future direction of the market.

• News Coverage & Publications: More than 409 400 publications related to 5G technologies and advancements appeared over the last year.
• Funding Rounds: It remains highly attractive to investors, with 5603 funding rounds recorded in our database.
• Manpower: The sector supports a large workforce of over 1.8 million employees, adding more than 102 800 new workers during the past year alone.
• Patents: The industry generated 76 247 patents and highlights continuous advancements across hardware, software, and infrastructure domains.
• Grants: Public and private funding support is evident, with 2110 grants awarded to accelerate research, development, and deployment efforts within the 5G ecosystem.
• Yearly Global Search Growth: Interest in 5G continues to surge, as reflected by a 96.66% yearly growth in global online search activity for 5G-related topics.

Explore the Data-driven 5G Industry Outlook for 2025

With 2260 startups and 14 059 businesses actively developing solutions, products, and apps for diverse industries, the heatmap showcases the thriving worldwide 5G ecosystem based on our data.

The number of announced 5G devices reached 2601 as of May 2024, up by more than 107% since 2022, indicating rapid ecosystem development.

Credit: IoT Analytics

The 5G industry saw a remarkable 20.38% growth in the last year, supported by 2110 grants and 76 247 patents that highlight continuous technological advancements and innovation activities.

LexisNexis IP reports that declared 5G granted patent families more than doubled from 25 000 in 2021 to over 57 000 by October 2024, with major holders including Huawei, Qualcomm, and Ericsson.

Nokia alone reached 7000 patent families declared essential to 5G by January 2025.

According to StartUs Insights, the 5G industry employs more than 1.8 million people globally and added 102 800 new workers last year. This demonstrates its high demand for talent and continuous workforce growth.

The 5G rollout in India is expected to create millions of new jobs, with an ambitious target of developing a skilled workforce of at least 8 million by the end of 2025.

The USA, China, India, Germany, and the UK are the top country hubs, and the top city hubs are Shenzhen, London, Beijing, Shanghai, and Tokyo.

Credit:  TechSci Research

Additionally, China and the USA lead in bandwidth expansion and 5G rollout, with China excelling in connection numbers and the USA in city coverage.

Credit:  TechSci Research

A Snapshot of the Global 5G Market

With an annual growth rate of 20.38%, the 5G industry is showing great momentum, fueled by a vibrant global ecosystem of startups and established businesses.

With anticipated compound annual growth rates (CAGRs) ranging from 18.5% in the USA to 21.5% in China between 2025 and 2035, as well as even higher growth in certain segments like network slicing (CAGR 43.3%) and standalone 5G infrastructure (CAGR 55.6%), the global 5G technology market is growing quickly.

There are 2260 startups in this industry, 646 of which are categorized as early-stage companies. This suggests that there is a strong innovation environment and a steady pipeline of emerging 5G technologies and business models.

With network operators, equipment vendors, and technology providers consolidating, mergers and acquisitions (M&A) activity in the telecom and tech sector is expected to remain high this year. Notable deals include T-Mobile’s joint venture with EQT to acquire Lumos and Nokia’s USD 2.3 billion acquisition of Infinera.

Companies like CityFibre, Airspan, and SoftBank are also actively acquiring assets or firms to strengthen their positions in 5G and related technologies.

As players look for strategic expansion and competitive advantages, 478 organizations have undergone mergers and acquisitions. This indicates aggressive consolidation in terms of corporate development.

With 76 247 patents filed by 25 625 applicants, the intellectual property (IP) environment is equally active and demonstrates notable innovation across the 5G value chain.

The 5G patent environment is highly dynamic. As of March 2025, the USA had 84 517 5G-related patents, China 77 658, and Europe 62 543. China and the USA together account for nearly half of all 5G patents worldwide.

Credit:  GreyB

Globally, more than 25 000 applicants have applied for 5G patents. The top holders are Huawei (9597), Qualcomm (8046), LG (6994), Samsung (6733), and Ericsson (6187).

Credit:  GreyB

Moreover, the number of declared 5G granted patent families more than doubled from 25 000 in 2021 to over 57 000 by October 2024, reflecting rapid growth and intense competition.

China has emerged as the top issuer, further highlighting its crucial role in forming the global 5G innovation scene, and patent activity has increased by 7.61% year over year.

Explore the Funding Landscape of the 5G Market

With an average funding round of over USD 77 million, the 5G industry continues to see a high level of investment activity. This indicates sustained investor confidence in the technology’s potential.

Over 5500 investors have actively participated in funding and contributed to more than 5603 closed investment rounds across various stages of company growth and development.

Over 1486 businesses have successfully secured funding to support their research, expansion, and commercialization initiatives. This demonstrates the industry’s ability to draw substantial capital from multiple sources.

This financial momentum shows that a wide range of investors, from corporate investors to venture capital firms, are eager to profit from the unfolding global 5G revolution.

Who is Investing in the 5G Market?

The combined investment value by the top investors in the 5G sector exceeds USD 13.68 billion, according to our data. This underscores strong strategic and financial support for the industry’s growth.

• European Investment Bank invested around USD 3.8 billion across 6 companies. The EIB has also financed the rollout of 5G mobile telecommunications in Sweden to expand coverage from 20% to over 99%.
• Amazon supported 3 companies with investments totaling USD 1.8 billion. AWS has also collaborated with 5G companies like Mavenir, focusing on cloud-native 5G applications and infrastructure.
• NGP Capital backed 2 companies and invested approximately USD 1.3 billion. Additionally, it led a USD 30 million funding round for Skylo, a direct-to-device satellite firm enabling 5G connectivity.
• Macquarie Group invested USD 1.3 billion in at least 1 company. The company also committed up to USD 5 billion to Applied Digital’s high-performance computing data centers, which support AI and 5G infrastructure.
• Cassa Depositi e Prestiti contributed USD 1.3 million toward at least 1 company. It also invested heavily in Italy’s telecom sector, including a 9.8% stake in Telecom Italia (TIM) valued at approximately USD 460 million.
• Nokia Corporation supported 2 companies with a total investment of USD 1.2 million. Nokia has also secured multi-year, multi-billion-dollar 5G RAN deals with major operators, like T-Mobile US.
• Xiaomi invested USD 1.1 billion across 5 companies.
• Telenor invested approximately USD 1 billion in 2 companies. It also plans to invest USD 9.45 million to expand sovereign cloud with AWS.
• GIC backed 4 companies with investments amounting to USD 880.7 million.
• Kohlberg Kravis Roberts & Co. invested USD 807 million in at least 1 company.

Top 5G Market Innovations & Trends

Discover the emerging trends in the 5G market along with their firmographic details:

• Metamaterials: About 10 000 people are employed by 278 businesses in this domain, and 840 new hires have been added in the last 12 months. The increasing demand for advanced antenna designs, signal augmentation, and lightweight, high-performance materials is driving its steady growth at an annual rate of 4.8%.
• Beamforming Solutions: A total of 306 businesses, employing 23 700 experts and adding 837 new hires in the past year, are actively developing beamforming technology. To enhance 5G performance and user experiences, network providers are giving priority to precise signal delivery and decreased interference. Additionally, this is driving this segment’s remarkable 21% annual growth rate.
• Small Cells: 1086 businesses are employing 151 700 employees and added 8800 last year. The small cell 5G domain’s annual growth is expanding at a rate of 2.59% each year and is essential to 5G network densification and reliable coverage in densely populated areas.

5 Top Examples from 2260+ Innovative 5G Startups

The five innovative startups showcased below are picked based on data, including the trend they operate within and their relevance, founding year, funding status, and more. Book a demo to find promising startups, emerging trends, or industry data specific to your company’s needs and objectives.

Obvios offers Private 5G

Obvios is a French company that develops Dome, a standalone (SA) software-defined private 5G network core solution. Its cloud-native architecture leverages container-based network functions and Kubernetes for automated, scalable, and immutable deployments.

Dome also ensures continuous threat detection, analysis, and automated mitigation to protect against cyberattacks. It further provides high-bandwidth, low-latency mobile links for industrial automation, multimedia collaboration, autonomous vehicles, and more.

Montsecure improves 5G Network Security

Montsecure is a German startup that offers SEAL, a 5G security testing tool. It automates vulnerability testing and attack simulation for users to identify and address security weaknesses efficiently.

The tool implements the 3GPP testing standard. This makes it suitable for compliance with industry evaluation schemes like GSMA NESAS and BSI NESAS-CCS-GI. Moreover, this allows vendors, test labs, operators, and integrators to automate vulnerability assessments and speed up the time to market.

Infinite Wireless enables SIM-free, 5G Connectivity

USA-based company Infinite Wireless provides SIM-free 5G and LTE connectivity through virtual SIMs. The company’s plug-and-play devices automatically connect to the best-fit wireless network to deliver high-throughput connectivity.

iCana manufactures RF Semiconductor Integrated Circuits (ICs)

iCana is a Taiwanese startup that manufactures RF components for 5G infrastructure. The company’s product lineup targets Sub-6 GHz spectrum and includes high-efficiency power amplifiers, gain amplifiers, and integrated receiver front-end modules. Additionally, this enables vendors, network operators, and OEMs to speed up infrastructure deployment.

Astellatech offers an O-RAN Solution

Astellatech is a Hong Kong-based company that builds an O-RAN-compliant 5G infrastructure software suite. It supports processor platforms like NXP, ARM, FPGA, and Intel to ensure flexible and scalable deployments.

The startup’s products include 5G distributed units, a mmWave base station, and 5G-integrated small cells along with the software suite. These products further enable large/mid-scale operator networks and private enterprise networks to mitigate in-house product development and save costs.

Gain Comprehensive Insights into 5G Market Trends, Startups, and Technologies

The 5G industry is entering a new phase of expansion, with advanced technologies, cross-sector collaborations, and targeted investments reshaping connectivity and digital infrastructure worldwide.

As network deployments mature, the focus will increasingly shift toward improving efficiency, enabling new applications, and integrating complementary innovations like edge computing, AI, and IoT. Moreover, by aligning strategies with emerging trends and remaining agile in a changing environment, 5G businesses can ensure long-term growth opportunities and stay ahead.

Get in touch to explore 2260+ startups and scaleups, as well as all market trends impacting 5G companies.