5G Will Shape all of the Vertical Market

The International Engineering and MIS 2018 Conference and the International Engineering and Computer Workshop were held in Istanbul. The Chairman of ICTA participated in the program. Dr. Ömer Fatih Sayan mentioned the importance of 5G.

The International Engineering and MIS 2018 Conference and the International Engineering and Computer Workshop organized by Altınbaş University welcomed their guests in Istanbul. As the speaker of the program, the Chairman of the Information and Communication Technologies Authority Dr. Ömer Fatih Sayan said, "We are at the distinction between traditional mobile communication and innovative futuristic technologies. 5G and beyond will first change the communications industry and then shape all vertical sectors like energy, manufacturing, health, automotive, transportation and finance."

Reminding that 3G mobile communications technology allows high data usage after 2G technologies and increasing mobile penetration rates with mobile phones, Sayan said, "At present, one third of the 7.2 billion people in the world are using 4G technologies. In the future, 5G has features that will change the paradigms of both communication and other sectors. With 5G, not only people, but also everything will communicate with each other. By 2025, it is estimated that there will be one hundred billion (100 billion) different communications around the world, with only ten percent (10%) of them being personal. To be ready for this new era, public authorities, the private sector and the academic community have different and complementary roles. In addition to the 4G systems currently in use, standardization efforts for fifth generation (5G) mobile communication technologies, which are expected to be in the market in 2020, are underway. For this purpose, 3GPP approved the independent 5G New Radio specification. The non-standalone (NSA) version of the standard was adopted in December of 2017. The NSA portion of the standard will benefit from the LTE core network and the SA portion will be deployed independently."

Sayan said that 5G will play an important role in strengthening socio-economic transformations by boosting efficiency, sustainability and general welfare by triggering innovation in the vertical sectors using the communication industry and communication technology infrastructure. "By complementing the achievements of the evolution of LTE and introducing some radical new capabilities will bring much more. 5G will have the social change power. 5G basically covers three main substances. These include: enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), ultra-reliable low latency communications (URLLC), and massive machine type communications (mMTC). With its high data rate, very low latency, higher data capacity, energy and cost efficiency, 5G is expected to enable significant changes in sectors such as energy, automotive, healthcare, transportation and logistics, environment and agriculture, media and entertainment. On the other hand, with 5G, significant changes are expected in the core network and the physical network. Operators have accelerated their efforts to make their networks software and virtual-based. SDN/NFV applications and virtual network functions have very important role in this context. Millimeter waves, network slicing, massive MIMO and other infrastructure applications are also very important issues. These technologies will meet the requirements of 5G".

There are intensive studies on 5G in the world

Sayan shared his knowledge that ICTA is preparing “5G and Vertical Sectors Report”, “There are intensive studies on 5G and beyond technologies in the world. The 5GTR Forum was established in order to develop the local and native high quality products, services and technologies that will take place in world markets in 5G and beyond new generation mobile communication systems with the cooperation of public-industry and academics in local and international level and with the stakeholders in the ecosystem. In order to ensure that 5GTR Forum activities can be conducted efficiently in a short period; under the 5GTR Forum organizational structure, Working Groups for Core Network, Physical Network, Service and Application and Standardization were established and under these four working groups 15 sub-working groups were established and started their activities. These working groups are primarily preparing a White Paper for our country that includes 5G and above priorities and road maps, and the White Paper is about to be completed at the moment. Then it is aimed to produce projects on the priority issues in our country according to the priorities and road map to be determined in the White Paper”.

Chairman Sayan emphasize that they attach great importance to international co-operation and added: “In the context of international cooperation, in the 4th Global 5G Event held in Seoul, aiming at the development of external relations with organizations that are equivalent to the 5GTR Forum, two separate Memoranda of Understanding were signed between the 5GTR Forum and the 5G Forum Korea and between the 5GTR Forum and Japan 5GMF on November 23, 2017. This cooperation agreement with the 5G forums of Korea and Japan, which are the most ambitious countries for 5G and beyond technologies, will be useful for strengthening the relations between the 5GTR Forum and the related platforms and for developing 5G and beyond activities in our country and informing the developments in the world. Especially the cooperation between universities, operators and producers in our country and in Korea and Japan is expected to be opened.”

Speaking about another important project, 5G Valley Open Test Site, Chairman Sayan said, "The 5G Valley Open Test Site Project, which is conducted under the coordination of ICTA, is set in the area between METU, Bilkent and Hacettepe Universities' campuses and ICTA Headquarters, which aims to create an environment where research centers, universities, and start-up companies can test the applications and technologies and make contributions related to 5G and beyond. On 15 August 2017, the 5G Valley Open Test Ground Cooperation Protocol was signed in the 17th Year of ICTA Ceremony by the Information and Communication Technologies Authority, Hacettepe University, İhsan Doğramacı Bilkent University, Middle East Technical University, Avea Communication Services Inc., Turkcell Communication Services Inc. and Vodafone Telecommunication Inc.

5G Valley is planned to establish an infrastructure for R&D, product development and testing of 5G and beyond technologies in cooperation with ICTA, universities and operators, and the 5G Valley Steering Committee, which consists of representatives of the protocol parties, has started to work within this scope. Regarding the issue of setting up the 5G Test Network Infrastructure, various discussions were held with the protocol parties and the organizations that have related work on the actions that could be taken for the subnetwork components of the network, the physical network, the core network and the service and application domain. The ceremony held on May 24, 2018 in the 5G Valley Open Test Site to create a “5G and Beyond Joint Graduate Support Program” between universities and companies to increase the number of qualified manpower that our country would need in 5G and beyond in short and medium term signing protocol was made with 5G Valley parties. The program aims to produce outputs in a wide variety of forms such as patents, projects, articles, spin-off companies, with the ability to create sustainable competence on advanced communication technologies and to carry out thesis studies. On the other hand, we are aiming to have a similar project in Istanbul as well.”