San Diego, California, USA
25 May 2016
Open Source and Standards for 5G:
A Joint ITU and NGMN Alliance Workshop on “Open Source and Standards for 5G” took place at Qualcomm Headquarters in San Diego, California on 25 May 2016. This workshop was followed by a meeting of the TSB Director’s ad hoc group on Intellectual Property Rights from 26 to 27 May 2016 at the same venue. Both events were kindly hosted by Qualcomm.
Context of the event:
Mobile communication has seen revolutionary developments and growth in recent years. New demands, including applications requiring very high data rates, many additional devices connected with diverse service requirements, better quality of service and experience, calls for an increasing number of innovative solutions. The rapid adoption of mobile broadband services and growing expectations from users for superior mobile broadband experiences are motivating industry, academia and governments to explore how to meet these demands.
5G, or International Mobile Telecommunications for 2020 and beyond (IMT-2020), is expected to provide a future-proofed basis for communications from the year 2020 onwards. In comparison to current generations of mobile networks, 5G systems will provide users with higher bit rates, higher reliability and lower latency - matching the speed and reliability achieved by fibre-optic infrastructure - to support new services in areas such as health care, safety and automation.
Great progress is being made en route to the first 5G systems, but significant challenges remain to be addressed: some of them technical in nature, others related to the management of intellectual property rights and availability of 5G technology.
Objectives of the event:
This event brought together leading experts from the standards and open-source communities to discuss topics related to the interplay between standards and open source in 5G, including issues such as legal challenges, opportunities for collaboration and modes of engagement between standards and open source communities.
5G presents a unique opportunity for new forms of innovation and collaboration; and ITU and NGNM invited you to join the discussion.
The morning session focused on technical issues, led by a panel of standards and open-source experts, explored the challenges ahead and discussed the mutual value of open-source involvement.
The afternoon session moved on to intellectual property right issues, including:
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Are standards and open-source licensing regimes compatible?
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Should open-source licenses be pre-defined or left open for negotiations?
- Which is more efficient, open-source or patent-pool licenses?
- Patent ambush: threats and mitigations.
Target AudienceThe event was opend to members and non-members of the ITU, and it allowed a unique mix of standards bodies, industry players and government representatives from around the world to exchange ideas and search for possible solutions on this key issue of evolving telecommunication technologies.
