5Gearing

The digital trans­for­ma­tion of Industry 4.0 is led by the automa­tion of manu­fac­turing processes. Indus­trial appli­ca­tions are quite hetero­ge­neous and place different demands on the commu­ni­ca­tion system. Recently, the trans­for­ma­tion to Industry 5.0 has also been initi­ated, which empha­sizes the involve­ment of humans in the increas­ingly auto­mated phys­ical processes. At the same time, 5G wire­less tech­nology is evolving to support highly diverse and hetero­ge­neous envi­ron­ments for various appli­ca­tions.

The 5G wire­less tech­nology promises to provide connec­tivity for the Indus­trial Internet of Things scenarios due to its support for deter­min­istic and highly reli­able low-latency commu­ni­ca­tions. However, the require­ments of indus­trial appli­ca­tions can be partic­u­larly demanding and need to be care­fully analyzed. Not only is low latency commu­ni­ca­tion required, but some­times high device density, high data rates, posi­tioning, and auto­mated service provi­sioning are desired. In addi­tion, edge computing and arti­fi­cial intel­li­gence with data-driven system design open up new dimen­sions for process opti­miza­tion. These tech­no­log­ical advances need to be tested and deployed to support the vision of Industry 5.0.

The overall goal of 5GEARING is to develop 5G network deploy­ment scenarios for indus­trial appli­ca­tions by addressing issues such as coverage plan­ning, inter­fer­ence avoid­ance, secu­rity, and safety.

Project goals

• Develop guide­lines for the deploy­ment, config­u­ra­tion, and eval­u­a­tion of 5G campus networks for indus­trial appli­ca­tions, involving customers, vendors, service providers, and inte­gra­tors.
• Work with industry to under­stand and develop solu­tions for inno­v­a­tive use cases.
• Address 5G network deploy­ment issues such as secu­rity, safety, trust­wor­thi­ness, etc.
• Develop smart ways to plan coverage and avoid inter­fer­ence.
• Estab­lish a 5G campus network as a show­case for the manu­fac­turing industry, consid­ering forward-looking spec­trum expan­sion in rural areas and support from oper­a­tors and service providers.