Abstract:
Looking at the UN SDGs and the IMT-2030 Framework, there is a clear key requirement to make 6G a technology for connecting the unconnected. Four years of international research have been globally undertaken to understand the key technology enablers of 6G and 3GPP is starting in 2025 the international standardization of 6G. in parallel there is the global recognition, that 5G has not delivered what it has promised a decade ago, as it has become a very expensive technology due to the complex standards and involved patents, which make 5G products too expensive for many industries and developing countries. Particular network coverage remains a key challenge in both developed and developing countries.
In addition, we have recognized the global rise of private 5G networks due to new spectrum policies and the increasing understanding that there is now “one network fits all” delivered by public network operators, but rather highly customized future-proof enterprise networks are needed. In this context, new value chains and business models are arising with the digital transformation of many industries, where the highly customized communications infrastructure represents an important, but small part of the overall end to end enterprise IT/OT system architecture.
As networks are already software-based from the 5th generation of mobile networks and many experts consider 6G as an evolution of 5G in regard to fulfilling finally the 5G promises to make it the ultimate, highly customizable communications infrastructure for a waste diversity of industrial application domains. We believe that there is a high potential to shape 6G as a more sustainable and economic network technology to particularly enable the less developed countries to build their own customized future networks for their different public and private sectors. However, it is also important to stress, that the main challenge is not only the developing countries, as we also witness many unconnected areas in developed countries. Also, the industries are looking for more affordable, self-sovereign communication technologies in their industrial transformation based on emerging local ecosystems providing the needed end to end network components and edge / cloud virtualization infrastructures.
The virtualization of networks has created a vivid Open Source community in the last two decades and we believe strongly, that this community could help in addressing the above challenges by providing the building blocks and toolkits, enabling researchers and developers around the globe to build up their own expertise and infrastructures to develop local eco systems for (re)establishing the digital self-sovereignty of their countries.
In this workshop we want to bring together international experts from both communications as well as industries from developing and developed countries to discuss the related challenges, approaches, and experiences to solve them while building up sustainable 5G and 6G private and public networks.
Organizers:
- Thomas Magedanz, Technische Universität Berlin, Germany
- Ramona Modroiu, Technische Universität Berlin, Germany
- Joyce Mwangama, University of Cape Town, South Africa
- Tony Quek, Singapore University for Technology and Design, Singapore
- Christian Esteve Rothenberg, University of Campinas, Brazil