KT joins global forum to speed up delivery of 5G

By Lim Chang-won Posted : January 17, 2020, 11:18 Updated : January 17, 2020, 13:58

[Gettyimages Bank]


SEOUL -- A global forum was launched by five key mobile carriers in North America and other regions to accelerate the development of interoperable 5G specifications and develop single specs for mobile edge computing that enables cloud computing capabilities and an IT service environment at the edge of cellular networks.

The 5G Future Forum groups South Korea's KT, Verizon of the United States, Britain's Vodafone, Mexico's America Movil, Canada's Rogers and Australia's Telstra, which has commercialized 5G in each country.

The forum will focus on the creation of uniform interoperability specifications to improve speed to market for developers and enterprises working on 5G-enabled solutions. Forum participants will develop public and private marketplaces to enhance developer and customer access to 5G.

5G MEC is designed to be implemented at cellular base stations or other edge nodes and enables flexible and rapid deployment of new applications and services for clients. By running applications and performing related processing tasks closer to the cellular customer, network congestion is reduced and applications perform better.

"This partnership will deliver the most competitive and continuous services based on 5G infrastructure to our customers, and provide developers with edge platform to deploy solutions around the world," KT chief technology officer Jeon Hong-beom said in a joint statement.

Verizon CEO Hans Vestberg said, "We are proud to join with our fellow 5G leaders to unlock the full potential of applications and solutions that will transform with 5G's fast speeds, high reliability, improved security and single-digit latency."

5G MEC delivers lowest latency networks to mobile and connected devices while improving data throughput, reliability, power efficiency and security. Participants in the forum vowed to create a common platform to enable a global 5G ecosystem.

On January 13, SK Telecom (SKT), a top mobile carrier in South Korea, announced the establishment of a cooperative system called "Global MEC TF" in Asia to share and co-develop 5G-based MEC technologies. SKT will play a leading role in establishing standards for borderless MEC platforms.

Global MEC TF groups SKT, Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel), Taiwan Mobile, Globe Telecom in the Philippines, Hong Kong Telecom (HKT) and PCCW Global in Hong Kong, all from the Bridge Alliance, which was built on seamless service connectivity and a suite of integrated value-added services for subscribers while roaming on each other's networks.
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