THE West Midlands will have to wait to hear whether it has won a government contract to build the country’s first large-scale 5G network.

It has been announced that the region is in the running to receive over £100 million in government funding toward the project.

5G stands for ‘fifth generation mobile networks’, and is the next step along the road from 3G and 4G. It is expected to be at least ten times faster than 4G, though some estimates predict it could be up to 100 times faster.

Proposals would see 5G rolled out across the Black Country.

It was expected that the government would announce its shortlist on Friday (June 29), but it seems the region will have to wait a little longer to find out whether it has made it to the next stage.

Once the shortlist is announced, the bidding process will see the Government listen to full proposals from each of the successful regions, before making a final decision before the end of the summer.

When asked how long it would be before the West Midlands could expect to see this technology rolled out, Mayor Andy Street said that the government were eager to get the initiative moving:

“The timeline, interestingly, is actually a very quick decision for a government commitment of this scale,” he said.

“At the moment they’re talking about a decision by the end of July. They are saying it will be quite soon. There’s always room for slippage, but that’s what they’re saying.

“In terms of beginning implementation it would be next year. But this is not a sort of, ‘2026 it might happen’ thing.

“They really want to push on and get an area up and running with the technology very very soon.”