![Woman and man on a construction site](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/eip/three-business/british-economy-5g/people-in-high-vis.jpg?imwidth=680)
From 5G cranes to metaverse games, connectivity is reshaping British industry
Taking a look at the four key areas of Britain’s economy that have been transformed by 5G
![Woman and man on a construction site](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/eip/three-business/british-economy-5g/people-in-high-vis.jpg?imwidth=680)
From cranes controlled via remote 5G connections to fashion retail in which the metaverse is your changing room, connectivity is enabling a revolution across every sector in Britain.
From retail to construction, and from health to transport, innovations driven by 5G mobile connectivity are reshaping the way Britain lives, shops and works.
Here we focus on pioneering businesses in these four sectors to show how 5G can change the way Britain works – and how wider technological trends, sparked by 5G, are changing these sectors.
Retail
The retail industry is embracing the potential of connectivity, and in particular 5G, with a mobile payment revolution sweeping Britain.
Nine out of 10 UK SMEs already take contactless payments (more than any other country in Europe) and Britain has also embraced mobile ecommerce, with 60 per cent of online retail sales now made from mobile phones, according to recent research.
Retailers such as Very.co.uk are rolling out ‘virtual try-on’ capabilities, where customers can try on clothing or make-up in augmented reality before buying. Shoppers can also use mobile app-based technology from ModiFace to virtually ‘try on’ 24 lip products on an image of their own face.
![Man trying a. virtual try-on service at home](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/eip/three-business/british-economy-5g/augmented-reality-retail.jpg?imwidth=350)
At the same time, mobile apps also offer retailers insights into purchasing patterns, and an opportunity to reach customers with personalised recommendations via messaging apps and chatbots.
Veteran British shoe company Clarks has pioneered using the metaverse as a way to reach younger audiences. The company, founded in 1825, now offers online games within the metaverse platform Roblox, where gamers can win points by doing their best BMX moves or racing to the Parkour finish line, while customising avatars with Clarks goods.
Clarks has also staged metaverse concerts with Afrobeat artists such as Fireboy DML, and showed off its shoes at Metaverse Fashion Week 23, presenting ‘vintage aesthetics and arcade videogame vibes’.
Construction and manufacturing
A windswept construction site in the remote Shetland Islands is showcasing the potential of 5G to change the way things work in construction and manufacturing.
Led by civil engineers BAM Nuttall, the 5G-connected construction site is forging a link which will attach Shetland to the British electricity grid for the first time.
The site is inaccessible, windswept and often dark in the winter months – meaning that management teams often can’t easily get access.
5G enables workers at the site to update managers with reports, data and images, so that they can see the progress being made from hundreds of miles away. It means teams working on this remote island can collaborate with others a large distance away as they work on rolling out the grid remotely.
The team has also been testing advanced technologies such as construction robotics at the site, using the Boston Dynamics Spot robot via the private 5G network, with a Trimble X7 3D laser scanner mounted on the robot to gather data.
The low-latency connectivity of 5G is crucial to deploying these technologies – and BAM Nuttall is now working on a ‘plug-and-go’ 5G solution for all its construction sites.
In industry, pioneering companies have investigated using 5G and augmented reality to support workers, either on the factory floor or via training, and for real-time process monitoring and the remote control of vehicles.
Healthcare
The pandemic sparked the rapid adoption of virtual GP and other primary care consultations, and has sparked a wave of innovation.
For the over-burdened NHS, digital apps such as Consultant Connect offer the possibility of cutting unnecessary hospital visits and easing the strain on time-pressed GPs.
Consultant Connect connects primary care (GPs and paramedics) directly to specialist consultants in areas such as cardiology, dermatology and gynaecology.
![A man having a virtual appointment with a doctor](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/eip/three-business/british-economy-5g/virtual-gp.jpg?imwidth=350)
The Consultant Connect app is now being used by more than half of the NHS, and in two out of three cases results in the avoidance of unnecessary hospital visits, says Jonathan Patrick, CEO of Consultant Connect, which is now Britain’s largest telemedicine provider, its app helping to ensure patients get faster and better care.
GPs are often connected to consultants within 30 seconds and share photos of patients to show specific conditions (in a secure and data-protective way), which are responded to within hours.
Across the sector, mobile data connectivity is helping to streamline processes and enhance communication, including in emergency response situations, where first responders can now get rapid access to patient information on site.
Transport
Across Britain, connectivity is poised to change the way transport and logistics work, with ‘connected’ vehicles enabling a more efficient and sustainable future.
An ambitious Government project is creating a ‘digital twin’ of the UK’s entire transport network to shape future decarbonisation strategies.
This involves using data from sensors and other systems to create a virtual ‘twin’ of a real-world object: digital twins are widely used in industry, for example, to monitor devices such as turbines remotely.
Around a third of the UK’s total carbon emissions come from transport, and the project is among the most ambitious ‘digital twinning’ yet undertaken.
Researchers hope that information gleaned from the digital twin will enable policy-makers to develop risk-free approaches to deploying environmental solutions.
Connectivity is also enabling ports such as the Port of Felixstowe to deploy advanced technology.
![Port Felixstowe](/https/www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/eip/three-business/british-economy-5g/felixstowe-port.jpg?imwidth=350)
The port, which handles 36% of Britain’s containerised freight, is trialling 5G technology to connect cranes.
On six of the giant quay cranes at the busy port, workers use internet of things (IoT) sensors to monitor the health of cranes, plus an AI predictive model which predicts anomalies in performance.
This means that preventative maintenance can be carried out on the huge machines.
Workers at the port also tested remote-controlling cranes via 5G using CCTV imagery.
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