5G/SatCom convergence

• Tuesday, 13 June 2017, 11:30-13:00, Room Radisson Blu Nuotta&Luoto
• Session Chair: Maria Guta (ESA, The Netherlands), Omar Iqbal (Avanti, UK), Thomas Heyn (Fraunhofer-IIS, Germany)

Recent years have witnessed a series of ambitious initiatives involving satellite system – including the advent of very high throughput Terabit/s class satellites, low-earth orbit megaconstellations and stratospheric high altitude platforms. These ambitious investments aim to provide a step-change in performance, cost and flexibility for broadband and narrowband connectivity services for a wide variety of existing and future applications - including pervasive high definition video, augmented reality, the Internet of Things and enhanced mobility support. The rapid evolution in satellite technology and service capabilities is key to the sector’s ambition to be an integral component of the future 5G landscape, in line with the 5G-PPPs vision of a converged connectivity future integrating different enabling network technologies.

To guarantee fast and ubiquitous 5G deployment, synergies and complementary value propositions between SatCom and terrestrial networks should be exploited. Key satellite strengths in coverage, mobility support, resilience and broadcast can be used to improve the overall quality and cost effectiveness of 5G service delivery in multiple verticals and operational scenarios. Examples of these include connectivity 3 / 4 in remote or rural settings, content distribution for media & entertainment, global mobility and crisis/emergency response.

The goal for SatCom is to converge seamlessly with 5G terrestrial communication systems and delivery mechanisms - by both developing harmonised standards and adopting operational concepts such as virtualisation (NFV) and “softwarisation” (SDN). This supports the necessary abstraction for 5G network functions independent of the implied resources (i.e. being satellite and/or terrestrial) and contributes to the provision of end-to-end connectivity services covering large scale heterogeneous access systems.

The purpose of the workshop is to:

a) Highlight the 5G verticals and uses cases where satellite can contribute compelling propositions,

b) Present architectural solutions for convergence and service delivery,

c) Report on recent technological advances in and initial results/lessons learnt from integrated 5G SatCom/terrestrial network testbeds and prototypes,

d) Report on specific satellite developments of interest to the 5G community, such as Software Defined Payloads, e) Provide an opportunity to share and further develop emerging concepts by collaboration between satellite, terrestrial and vertical domain stakeholders.