In December, Vodafone New Zealand will launch the latest generation mobile network in the resort alongside Auckland, Wellington and Christchurch.
Dunedin will miss out in the first instance.
Mr Burnes, whose group organises the district's tech innovation and start-up "ecosystem", said 5G was an exciting prospect.
People living in parts of the world already with 5G were looking for new products and services using "high bandwidth, near-real time data transfer capacity".
That gave Queenstown innovators the opportunity to create "disruptive" technology that could be exported.
"You don't have to be in a big metropolitan market to create cutting-edge tech.
"It puts us on a world stage of capacity when we're talking to innovators to come live and work here - we're not behind the eight-ball."
Asked why 5G would be launched in Queenstown before Dunedin, Mr Burnes cited the resort's reputation as a world-class tourist destination and its international airport.
It made "perfect sense" to deliver 5G's high-speed connectivity to the millions of visitors to the resort every year.
Many of those people would already be used to "data-rich" travel experiences, such as instant video transfer and augmented or virtual reality.
"There'll be a lot of cool things that will probably come as a result."
The 5G introduction was announced yesterday, the day Vodafone NZ's new owners, Infratil and Canada's Brookfield Asset Management, took control of the company.
Dunedin Mayor Dave Cull, Animation Research's Ian Taylor and Dunedin's Digital Community Trust chairman John Gallaher could not be reached for comment yesterday.
