Telekom Austria Group said it intends to play a decisive role in defining the future standard for 5G, after joining the Next Generation Mobile Networks (NGMN) Alliance.
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Günther Ottendorfer, Telekom Austria CTO |
"As a member of the NGMN Alliance, the Telekom Austria Group has committed itself to the definition of the 5G standards and can therefore make a significant contribution to future standardisation in the mobile communications area. We are delighted to have the opportunity to turn our 5G visions into reality in the years to come and to play a key role in determining future technological developments," said CTO Günther Ottendorfer.
Established in 2006, the main objective of the NGMN Alliance is to define common global standards for the development of next-generation mobile technologies. Now that LTE networks are in the process of being implemented across the world, the alliance has turned its focus to participating in the definition of 5G standards.
Telekom Austria joins a raft of other operators in the NGMN Alliance, including AT&T, BT, Deutsche Telekom, Telefónica, Vodafone, Orange and NTT DoCoMo. The alliance is currently working on a 5G white paper that it plans to complete before the end of 2014. The white paper, which is expected to set challenging technical and other ecosystem requirements for 5G, is due to be presented to the public in March next year.
The NGMN is just one of many projects that are working towards a definition of 5G, which is currently little more than a list of requirements. The European Commission's Horizon 2020 programme spawned the 5G Public Private Partnership (5G PPP), for example, while the UK-based University of Surrey's 5G Innovation Centre (5GIC) is in the process of developing what it describes as the world's first 5G test bed.
These initiatives join other government, industry, and university-led programmes in the European Union, China, Japan, South Korea and the U.S.
5G standardisation work is expected to start from 2015 or 2016, and 2020 has been established as the year when the world should see the first deployments of standardised elements of 5G networks.
The next World Radiocommunication Conference in 2015 (WRC-15) is also expected to set the agenda for WRC-19, which could include discussions on new spectrum allocations for future mobile broadband networks in frequency bands above 6 GHz, including millimetre wave frequencies. Under discussion at WRC-15 will be the allocation of sub-6 GHz frequency bands.
For more:
- see this Telekom Austria release
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