Jun 14, 2018

Today, the 3GPP TSG RAN Plenary Meeting in La Jolla, California approved the completion of the standalone (SA) Release 15 5G specifications. After the release of the 5G New Radio (NR) specifications for non-standalone (NSA) operation in Dec. 2017, this is another milestone in the standardization of 5G.

More than 800 delegates from the world's major telecom operators, network, terminals and chipset vendors, internet companies and other vertical industry companies were on hand for the historic moment for 5G.

This achievement paves the way for commercial launches of 5G-standard networks. The new SA specifications, which complement the NSA specifications, not only gives 5G NR the ability of independent deployment, but also brings a brand new end-to-end network architecture, making 5G a facilitator and an accelerator during the intelligent information and communications technology improvement process of enterprise customers and vertical industries.

Erik Ekudden, Senior Vice President and Chief Technology Officer, Ericsson, says: “5G is fast approaching commercial reality thanks to the dedicated, industry-wide standardization work lead by 3GPP, we together have accelerated the delivery of the standard well ahead of time. Together with our ecosystem partners we will sustain this momentum and ensure that communication service providers can successfully launch 3GPP standard-based 5G networks.”

Read the full announcement here.