The fifth generation of mobile technology (5G) is positioned to address the demands and business contexts of IMT 2020 and beyond. Standards Development Organizations (SDOs), industry fora and research projects have identified as common ground the need to i) enhance the network...
The fifth generation of mobile technology (5G) is positioned to address the demands and business contexts of IMT 2020 and beyond. Standards Development Organizations (SDOs), industry fora and research projects have identified as common ground the need to i) enhance the network architecture, in view of emerging technologies and features , and ii) push the envelope of performance, from network and user perspective, towards ultimate capabilities far beyond 4G, in support of a wide range of innovative use cases for various types of verticals. In this direction, under the 5G PPP Programme, Phase 1 projects have mapped the 5G requirements to specific Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) and formulated the overall 5G architecture that will achieve these KPIs. The ongoing 5G PPP Phase 2 projects are extending the work done in Phase 1 projects, by contributing to a selective experimentation of different technologies needed for the validation of the 5G architecture. With significant contribution from the research work of 5G PPP projects, 3GPP released recently early versions of the 5G standard incorporating end-to-end advances for the mobile network. In addition, the 5G Infrastructure Association (5G-IA), has already defined the roadmap towards the 5G Pan-European trials .
Irrefutably, the “Genesis of 5G†has entered the crucial phase of experimentation, and currently faces the challenge to validate the 5G network KPIs and verify the 5G technologies with an end-to-end approach. Towards this objective, a key challenge is to integrate all the highly diverse results and technologies from EU, global as well as internal (corporate) R&D projects, to “glue together†the 5G picture and unveil the potential of a truly full-stack, end-to-end 5G platform, able to meet the defined KPI targets.
In this context, the main goal of 5GENESIS will be to validate 5G KPIs for various 5G use cases, in both controlled set-ups and large-scale events. This will be achieved by bringing together results from a considerable number of EU projects as well as the partners’ internal R&D activities in order to realise an integrated End-to-end 5G
The five platforms of the 5GENESIS Facility, and their main features/orientation, are:
- The Athens Platform. An edge-computing-enabled shared radio infrastructure (gNBs and small cells), with different ranges and overlapping coverage that are supported by an SDN/NFV enabled core, to showcase secure content delivery and low latency applications in large public-events.
- The Málaga Platform. Automated orchestration and management of different network slices over multiple domains, on top of the 5G NR and fully virtualised core network to showcase mission critical services in the lab and in outdoor deployments.
- The Limassol Platform. Radio interfaces of different characteristics and capabilities, combining terrestrial and satellite communications, integrated to showcase service continuity and ubiquitous access in underserved areas.
- The Surrey Platform. Multiple radio access technologies that can support massive Machine Type Communications (mMTC), including 5G NR and NB-IoT, combined under a flexible Radio Resource Management (RRM) and spectrum sharing platform to showcase massive IoT services.
- The Berlin platform: Ultra dense areas covered by various network deployments, ranging from indoor nodes to nomadic outdoor clusters, coordinated via advanced backhauling technologies to showcase immersive service provisioning.
Key results and lessons learned from the experimentation in the platforms will be used in the project to develop and release a Portable 5G Demonstrator for live demonstration of the 5G PPP KPIs’ feasibility in multiple dissemination and communication events.
- Demonstrated feasibility of 5G PPP KPIs beyond 4G evolution (NB-IoT, 4G LTE-A-PRO), including at least KPIs for capacity, ubiquity, speed, latency, reliability, density of users, location accuracy, energy efficiency, service creation time, network management capex/opex. It requires clear analysis of the state of the art and how 5G goes beyond.
- Demonstration of innovative radio spectrum use and sharing applicable to 5G spectrum use, including - if appropriate - licensed, unlicensed or licensed-shared access.
- Validation of a representative end to end 5G architecture including end to end service provisioning with slicing capabilities and solving slicing issues between core and access.
- Demonstrated impactful contribution to standards. Participation of key European industrial partners with high standardisation impact is desired.
- Availability of 5G facility that may be further used for validation through specific vertical use cases and/or for large scale showcasing events.
- 5GENESIS framework will integrate APIs coming from 5GPPP projects to request network services and from emerging 3GPP standards for network access and configuration, especially considering the current 3GPP activities on the development of a common API framework (CAPIF) that includes common aspects applicable to any northbound APIs . All the platforms will offer cost-effective experimental field deployment as the kernel for further trial networks to be used in large scale events and to support further projects, like those in ICT-19_2019.
More info: https://5genesis.eu/.