Work of CNI within the Competence Centre 5G.NRW will be continued until 2025

Minister of Economics and Digital Prof. Dr. Andreas Pinkwart: "The Competence Center 5G.NRW has developed into an internationally renowned platform and has been able to promote the networking of all relevant 5G stakeholders with numerous information offerings and events. We want to build on these successes. I am very pleased that the Competence Centre will continue to serve us as an important contact point for 5G innovations made in North Rhine-Westphalia and, in the future, also for the future technology 6G."

With the continuation of the project term for another three years, we want to focus on the innovation potential of current developments and meet the high demand with different offers. The focus is particularly on new solutions for companies and municipalities as well as social and societal issues regarding security, social inclusion and sustainability. In particular, with the availability of the new spectrum around the 26 GHz frequency range, the application potential of own private 5G campus networks is also increasing. The Open RAN (Open Radio Access Networks) initiative also opens up the opportunity for small and medium-sized enterprises to benefit from the 5G market as providers of solutions and components. The evolution of mobile communications from 5G to 6G will further accelerate these developments. Moreover, 5G is no longer just a topic for industrial applications. Mobile technology also offers innovative solutions for improving the quality of life in urban and rural areas. Against this background, we will pursue three core goals in the coming years:

We will continue to build and expand the 5G.NRW network as an open innovation platform to bring together all stakeholders and concerns. Our website is the central point of information and communication. It bundles projects, members, dates, activities and news. 50 supporting institutions, 300 members, 37 projects and eleven test and demo centres are organised here. In addition, we support many other initiatives to make the potential of 5G accessible. These include: the newsletter with more than 3,500 subscribers, events such as the 5G.NRWeek and the 5G Roadshow, networking events, the 5G.NRW funding competition, the 5G model factory at FIR, the mobile 5G laboratory at TU Dortmund University, a campus network planner as an initial planning aid, 6G innovation screening and concept development and much more.

With the support of the Competence Centre since 2019, the state of North Rhine-Westphalia set the course for the introduction of 5G at an early stage. Since then, the CC5G.NRW has developed into a platform that is also appreciated internationally. We see the extension of the funding as confirmation and an incentive to continue the successful work of opening up the potential of 5G for all sectors of the economy and society.

A new focus of our future work will be the support of the mobile radio coordination in districts and independent cities funded by the state. At the same time, we are already looking ahead to the new 6G technology of the future. Here 5G.NRW will work closely with the 6GEM research hub funded by the Federal Ministry of Education and Research.

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