Nokia on Tuesday said it is gearing up for what it called the “first ever” demonstration of a 5G network running on commercial platforms.
The demonstration, which will be conducted at the 5G World conference in London this week, will combine Nokia’s 5G-ready AirScale Radio Access technology with its Cloud Packet Core kit and Nokia AirFrame data center platform, Nokia said. AirScale was released in February, Nokia said.
Nokia said the demonstration is part of its effort to accelerate the development and standardization of 5G and will show how the company is creating a “seamless fabric of dynamic networks” to serve an increasingly connected world. Nokia Bell Labs said it expects 46 billion connected devices will be in use shortly following the launch of 5G services in 2020.
Nokia said its AirScale Radio Access product supports a 4.5 GHz 5G centimeter wave access system using higher order MIMO antenna technology. The AirScale demonstration will be supplemented by demonstrations of Nokia’s Cloud Packet Core, including its Mobility Management Entity (MME), System Architecture Evolution (SAE) Gateway and the Home Subscriber Server (HSS) features all operating on Nokia’s AirFrame platform.
In addition to the AirScale demonstration, Nokia Bell Labs said it is planning to showcase a new concept in network slicing that will “create and automatically map capabilities for the radio, transport, core and application layers into a discreet network ‘slice.’”
The company said its demonstration will highlight how end-to-end network slicing will enable operators to utilize unique network characteristics to deliver specific applications and services, such as providing low-latency support to control machines in a factory or providing extreme high-speed broadband to enterprises and homes.