[Munich, Germany, February 11 2014]: Huawei, a leading global information and communications technology (ICT) solutions provider, is taking decisive action to make the 5th generation of wireless systems (5G) a reality for Europe. At the 5G@Europe Summit, which brought together European policy makers, service providers and technology leaders in Munich yesterday, participants discussed how best to join forces to speed up progress towards achieving this objective.
5G is the next generation of ultra-fast wireless networks that will power the technology of tomorrow. Huawei is investing a tremendous R&D effort in 5G research and innovation and aims to turn this investment into technological progress for Europe thanks to an open and collaborative approach involving industry partners, consortiums, universities and leading innovation platforms around the world.
Yesterday’s event will be part of this process. Bringing together some of the brightest minds from the EU and other regions, the 5G@Europe Summit provided the opportunity to discuss the challenges and opportunities involved in 5G including long term vision and requirements, key technology drivers and innovation as well as societal benefits. Keynote speakers included Luigi Gambardella, Chairman of ETNO, and Thibaut Kleiner, Head of Unit ‘Network Technologies’ at the European Commission’s DG CONNECT.
“5G will have a fundamental impact on the ICT industry and on our quality of life. Huawei is one of the driving forces in making 5G a reality,” said Dr Wen Tong, Head of Wireless Research and Head of Communications Technologies Laboratories at Huawei 2012 LAB. “We began investing in 5G in 2009, and recently announced plans to invest an additional US$600M for research and innovation into 5G technologies by 2018.”
Huawei will invest significant research and innovation efforts in Europe within the Horizon 2020 framework and beyond, especially at the Huawei European Research Centre (ERC).
As a member of the European research consortium METIS, Huawei ERC is at the forefront of 5G research by developing the key technology components of the 5G Wireless interface. The ERC is also one of the key contributors to the Advanced 5G Infrastructure public-private partnership programme (5GPPP) defined by the European Commission.
Huawei predicts that the first 5G networks will be ready for commercial deployment in 2020, delivering 1 000 times the capacity of current mobile networks and reaching peak data rates of over 10Gbps.
This ubiquitous connectivity will revolutionise the entire vertical industry and incubate emerging innovative industries. The 5G mobile network will for instance usher in the virtualised cloud computing platform, and the Internet of Things (IoT) is expected to achieve 50-100 billion connections by 2020.
In a White Paper released in January 2014, Huawei sets out its vision for 5G development and deployment. It defines key objectives including massive capacity and connectivity, support for an increasingly diverse set of services and efficient spectrum use.
The document also stresses that 5G depends on successful global LTE (4G) deployment. Huawei has already made a major contribution to advancing the uptake of this technology, helping to deploy the first commercial European 4G network in Sweden and Norway. The company’s wireless networks currently support more than 500 mobile operators and over two billion mobile subscribers on 3G and LTE networks worldwide.
Huawei calls for global collaboration among ecosystem partners, international trade associations, universities, governments and private sector companies to drive 4G and 5G technologies.
Europe has an important role to play in this collaborative process – to the benefit of both sides: while 5G, as a global technology, is vital for Europe’s global competitiveness, the success of European 5G is also critical to the global success of this new generation of wireless systems.
PR Archives: Latest, By Company, By Date