LAS VEGAS — One of the big benefits of 5G network slicing is that it promises flexibility and allows the network to be manipulated on the fly to accommodate different use cases. That has car makers, studio executives, and operators pretty excited about new business models that emerge from the 5G vision.

During a 5G panel at the CES here, Fathi El-Dwaik, vice president of information and communications electronics at BMW Group, said that one of the big draws of 5G is that it would allow the carmaker to offer a guaranteed service with a guaranteed data rate, something that is necessary for mission-critical applications.

Likewise, 20th Century Fox CTO Hanno Basse says that the improved network reliability promised by 5G will make it possible to stream new releases immediately to consumers. Basse said that reliability is a problem for mobile video, and customers don’t want to spend money to stream a movie over mobile if they aren’t guaranteed they can watch it right away.

With 5G, Basse says the company envisions being able to seed the network by storing content at the edge. “This way, it will be one hop away from the device,” Basse said. “When the street day hits [when the movie is released], we enable the transaction and people can take it on the plane or the train,” he added.

Some are also encouraged by 5G’s potential for delivering faster upstream data traffic. Alex Choi, CTO and head of corporate R&D at SK Telecom, said that currently, only 10 percent of data traffic is upstream and 90 percent is downstream. However, SK Telecom believes that 5G will allow it to improve the upstream pipeline so that the carrier will be able to deliver live broadcasting services.

Exactly what types of live broadcasting will be popular with end users is still uncertain, but Choi envisions consumers being able to upload augmented reality or virtual reality video feeds using the 5G network. “We are looking at creating a new media experience with upstream and downstream and production quality video,” he said.