Network slicing, despite all the hype that has surrounded it in the past few years, is seen as a long term option for most operators, at least as far as fully dynamic, end-to-end, multi-access slicing is concerned. But China Mobile, always one of the prime movers behind the technology, claims it will be offering slicing services as soon as it has a standalone 5G network (5G NR SA, with its own core), which will start as early as next year. China Mobile had originally been the sole MNO which aimed to deploy 5G SA from day one, rather than rolling out its first networks using the Non-Standalone (NSA) technology, which uses the LTE core. It pulled back from that stance…