Wait, why the hell is the ‘race to 5G’ even a race?

>But I sincerely doubt that all of these companies will pick up and move to China or Europe if the United States builds 5G networks slightly slower.

Author is not aware that there are not US based telecom companies left to compete for 4G/LTE/5G air infrastructure installations. There are only two Nordic companies and two Chinese plus Samsung with the smallest 3-4 percent market share.

US has never been the the fastest to adopt and install new mobile infrastructure and this has lead to the current situations. Nordic companies had small advantage in their home turf and they took over. Chinese came late into the game late are result of systematic work by their government.

Home markets are important for new technologies. US companies and startups are not going be first to sell 5G technologies and services to foreign markets if their home market is slow to adopt.