SAN JOSE, Calif. – A group of U.S. government agencies and corporations pledged to spend a total $400 million over seven years on research for 5G cellular networks. The news came one day after the U.S. Federal Communications Commission voted unanimously to allocate nearly 11 MHz of spectrum in millimeter-wave bands for 5G
Backers claimed the moves put the U.S. ahead in a global race to deliver a wide range of next-generation cellular services across frequencies from less than a gigahertz to more than 60 GHz. However companies and regions including China, Europe, Korea and Japan launched public-private consortia working on 5G years earlier.
Corporate experts involved in the U.S. efforts lauded the actions and expressed optimism for harmony in 5G spectrum and research efforts around the globe.
The U.S. effort comes under a new program of the National Science Foundation called the Advanced Wireless Research Initiative. AWRI aims to create four large 5G testbeds where corporate, government and academic researchers can work on next-generation cellular technologies and services.
The testbeds will be created by a public-private consortium under AWRI called the Platforms for Advanced Wireless Research program. PAWR will operate with a five-year budget of $85 million, $50 million of it from the NSF with the remaining $35 million in cash, equipment and manpower from a group of more than 20 companies.
Starting in fiscal year 2017, PAWR will define and build four 5G testbeds the size of small U.S. cities Corporate members of PAWR will get a seat on its board to write requests for proposals for the testbeds and choose among the submissions it receives.
The consortium’s work targets a range of 5G technologies including
Millimeter waves with data rates up to 100 Gbits/second over a few city blocks using small cells.
Dynamic spectrum use in sub-6 GHz bands
Architectures for wired data networks with a wireless edge
Architectures and management techniques for large-scale mobile networks
Techniques using spectrum “white space” to deliver Gbit/s links via long-range wireless meshes.
New ways to measure and monitor wireless network performance, security and reliability
Future cellular applications and services
Companies committing resources to PAWR include AT&T, Carlson Wireless Technologies, CommScope, HTC, Intel, InterDigital, Juniper Networks, Keysight Technologies, National Instruments, Nokia Bell Laboratories, Oracle, Qualcomm, Samsung, Sprint, T-Mobile, Verizon and Viavi Solutions.
Non-profit US Ignite will act as coordinator for the consortium which will be supervised by the NSF’s PAWR Project Office. The NSF will spend $350 million over seven years – the bulk of the money for the overall 5G initiative—on academic and government research programs operating in the new testbeds PAWR will create.
NSF currently funds more than $50 million in wireless research each year focused on technologies three-to-six years from the market.
“We expect this effort will speed up the transfer rate of breakthrough ideas from university research to industry end users, overcoming what is sometimes called the valley of death between basic research and commercialization,” said William Wallace, executive director of US Ignite in a press statement.
Other U.S. government agencies took the occasion to announce their own 5G efforts
For example, the Defense Advanced Research Programs Agencywill conduct a Spectrum Collaboration Challenge in the new testbeds. The grand challenge seeks new ways to let radio networks autonomously reason about how to share spectrum.
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) started in June an effort to map gaps in wireless research. The so-called The so-called Future Generation Communications Roadmap hopes to deliver on October a comprehensive document spanning areas such as waveforms, antennas, protocols, security, spectrum and architecture.
NIST also created a 5G mmWave Channel Model Alliance.It will discuss its preliminary results in December at IEEE GLOBECOM conference.
----Form EE Times