Sophia Antipolis: The ETSI MEC (Multi-access Edge Computing) group is pleased to announce a new White Paper which aims to describe the deployment options related to MEC federation, especially from an architectural point of view. With a key focus on ETSI MEC implementations, it also aims to provide an open approach taking into account other standards and technologies, including those from 3GPP SA Working Group 6 and GSMA OPG. For this purpose, the White Paper first analyses the recent publications of GSMA OPG and recent updates in ETSI MEC and 3GPP specifications, then introduces the synergized architecture supported by both standards organizations, which indicates the background information for the deployment of MEC federation harmonized standards for edge computing.

The paper also introduces the business cases that enable readers to understand how MEC federation is beneficial for MEC system providers. Based on these cases, corresponding deployment options are introduced. The aim is to help edge stakeholders, and all interested parties in general, to better understand how to choose the appropriate deployment options based on the use cases described in the document.

Additionally, this White Paper introduces some key considerations, i.e., connection between MEC systems, multi-domain orchestration and collaboration among operators and with cloud providers and third parties. An understanding of all these aspects will be beneficial for the future deployment of MEC federation and edge capability exposure in these heterogeneous environments.

Thus, this work aims to help infrastructure owners (including operators, service providers and MEC system providers) to evaluate the various options for MEC Federation, to enable global deployments of MEC. At the same time, the success of the edge computing market also depends on the engagement of edge application developers (including customers from vertical market segments). In fact, both categories of stakeholders (infrastructure owners and application developers) are essential for the growth of an edge ecosystem and adoption of MEC technology.

MEC Hackathons for developers

An important initiative to attract software and application development at the edge is the establishment of MEC Hackathons, creating technical challenges to inspire developers in building and designing new applications exploiting MEC infrastructure and envisaging innovative services using the MEC standard.

These MEC Hackathons represent ETSI continuous effort to help developers. Despite many challenges, they have been successfully organized since 2018 and are listed on the Wiki page here. The next MEC Hackathon is a fruitful collaboration between ETSI and the Linux Foundation. The 2022 edition of the MEC Hackathon will be jointly organized by ETSI MEC and LF Edge Akraino project and hosted at the Edge Computing World event.

In particular, the MEC Hackathon 2022 will aim to demonstrate an innovative Edge Application or Solution focused on the following application vertical use-cases with supporting ETSI MEC Service APIs and LF Edge Akraino Blueprint resources:

• Automotive: Produce a vehicular use case or service to enable intelligent traffic control, driving capabilities, increased safety, etc.
• Mixed and Augmented Reality: Produce an immersive application enabling interactivity of physical systems and human experiences
• Edge Computing and 5G: Deploy and use 5G and hybrid edge infrastructure to enable federation for distributed edge applications

Moreover, 5GAA (5G Automotive Association) has recently joined the organizing committee to further stimulate developers by awarding “the creation of the best automotive app” for this edition of the Hackathon. ETSI is offering an evolved implementation of the MEC Sandbox (including a recent introduction of the upcoming MEC GS 030 V2X API), as suitable reference for developers to utilize MEC service APIs.

“Since the beginning of its work the ETSI MEC Industry Specification Group (ETSI ISG MEC) is committed to working on engaging Infrastructure owners and application developers”, notes Dario Sabella, Chair of the ETSI ISG MEC. “The group is not only publishing standards and specifications enabling the deployment of edge infrastructures, but it also keeps attracting application developers and customers from many vertical market segments. The recent White Paper on MEC Federation, as complementary material to the current standards efforts in ETSI, 3GPP and GSMA OP, and the MEC Hackathon, in collaboration with Akraino, are great examples of commitment in these two key areas for the edge”.

Moving forward, ISG MEC continues to foster its collaborations with other Standards developing Organizations (e.g., 3GPP, ITU), industry groups (e.g., GSMA, 5GAA) and open-source projects (e.g., LF, Eclipse).