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Key vendors and major European operators has kicked off its race to develop new concepts and key components for a 5G mobile radio access technology which is expected to operate in a range of frequency bands between 6 and 100 GHz, including the so-called mm-Wave frequencies. Recently started project mmMAGIC consist of an international consortium led by Samsung. Aalto University´s radio frequency and microwave (RFMW) group led by Professor Katsuyuki Haneda has been an active member.

'mmMAGIC is co-funded by the European Commission’s 5G PPP program. The RFMW group is responsible for revealing the radio aspects of the 5G radio access. The unique experience and experimental facilities of the group makes it possible to lay foundations for the design and evaluation of the 5G radio access, particularly in the area of radio channels and antenna beamforming', Professor Haneda says.

The use of such extremely high frequencies for mobile communications is challenging but necessary for supporting 5G’s extreme mobile broadband service which will require very high (up to 10 Gbps) data rates, and in some scenarios, also very low end-to-end latencies (less than 5 ms). The project aims to accelerate standardisation of millimeter wave technologies for 5G so that the industry and citizens will benefit from commercialisation by 2020.

The mmMAGIC project will develop and design new concepts for mobile radio access technology (RAT) for deployment in the 6-100 GHz range, including novel waveform, frame structure and numerology, novel adaptive and cooperative beam-forming and tracking techniques to address the specific challenges of millimetre wave mobile propagation. This new RAT is envisaged as a key component in the overall 5G multi-RAT ecosystem.

Official launch of the project, over 60 delegates gathered at Samsung R&D Institute UK (SRUK) 7-8 July to discuss mmMAGIC’s first findings and launch project’s highly ambitious measurement campaigns, which will take place over the next 9 months in Germany, France, Finland, Sweden and the UK.

Seamless and flexible integration with other 5G and LTE radio interfaces are foreseen in the design of mmMAGIC’s radio network architecture and this will be realized through improved and entirely novel inter-networking functionalities that will be developed in the project. Self-backhauling and front hauling capabilities are also foreseen, thereby creating a holistic, scalable and economically viable integrated 5G solution to meet future needs of  operators, enabling, for example, ultra-high definition TV and video streaming,  virtual reality, immersive experience, and ultra-responsive cloud services in 5G for mobile users.

The ambition of the project is to pave the way for a European head start in 5G standards and to be a focal point for European and global consensus building on the architecture, key components and spectrum for 5G systems operating above 6 GHz.

More information:
Professor Katsuyuki Haneda
Aalto University
E-mail: katsuyuki.haneda@aalto.fi

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Horizon 2020 is the largest EU research and innovation programme ever, with nearly €80 billion in public funding available over seven years (2014-2020) in addition to the private investment it will attract. The 5G Public-Private Partnership (5G PPP) is an instrument launched as part of Horizon 2020, with a budget of €700 million in public funding expected to leverage five times this amount (€3.5 billion) in private investment.