King's College London joins European Industry and academic leaders as work starts on 5G

Working over a period of 2 and half years, the 5GNORMA project (5G Novel Radio Multiservice adaptive network Architecture), part of the 5GPPP initiative (5G Infrastructure Public-Private Partnership) will define the overall 5G mobile network architecture, including radio and core networks, meeting the demands of 5G. The resulting technological infrastructure includes Radio Access Network (RAN) and Core Network aspects.

Professor Mischa Dohler, Department of Informatics at King’s said ‘5G networks need to meet a wide array of diverse and extreme requirements such as high speed reliable internet connectivity, as well as combine new technologies and existing mobile radio and Wi-Fi. 5GNORMA will provide a new necessary infrastructure, which we need to manage the demands of these different services as well as build in flexibility for applications which we’ve not yet even created.’

The 5G NORMA project brings together leading players in the mobile services industry, to underpin Europe’s leadership position in 5G. The consortium believes the new 5G architecture will enable users to customise their mobile networks accordingly while also ensuring that stringent performance, security, cost and energy requirements are met.

5G is expected to begin its commercial rollout in 2020, by which time it is predicted that there will be up to 50 billion connected devices in the world, mainly in machine-to-machine communication. 5G networks will enable a wide variety of use cases such as evolved mobile broadband services, a range of machine-to-machine communication and media distribution.

A socio-economic analysis of the benefits of 5G NORMA innovations will also be conducted. This will determine the value to the wireless industry, the users in society and the public sphere of enhanced services enabled by the proposed architecture.

Dr. Werner Mohr, Chairman of the 5GPPP Association and Head of Research Alliances for Nokia Networks, said: “5G is not only about new radio access technology, network architecture will play an important role as well. 5G networks will have to be programmable, software driven and managed holistically to enable a diverse range of services in a profitable way. With 5G NORMA, the consortium aims to ensure economic sustainability of the network operation and open opportunities for new players, while leveraging a future-proof architecture in a cost- and energy-effective way.”

Notes to editors

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• The consortium will be working over a period of 30 months, beginning in July 2015. Key objectives include the creation and dissemination of innovative concepts on the 5G mobile network architecture for the 5G era. Some of these may be captured in products or patents, while others may emerge from the process and working engagements. Emphasis will also be placed on commercialisation, including partnerships and start-up creation.
• Industry players in the consortium include Alcatel-Lucent, NEC, Nokia Networks, ATOS (vendors & IT); Nokia, Deutsche Telekom, Orange, Telefonica (Operators); Azcom Technology, Nomor Research, Real Wireless (Small and Medium sized enterprises); and King’s College London, University Kaiserslautern in Germany, University Carlos III Madrid (Academia)
• The research outputs of King’s Department of Informatics were rated in the top 10 in Britain in the recent Research Excellence Framework (REF 2014), and the Department is particularly strong in artificial intelligence, robotics and telecommunications.