The Journal of mHealth Vol 1 Issue 2 (Apr 2014) | Page 13

Industry News

European 5G and the Prospects
for Connected Health
Despite being some way off,
5G mobile networks are gaining
considerable
ground,
particularly in Europe. This
infograph published by the
European Commission, illustrates the benefits that these
advanced networks could bring
to connected care.
On 17 December 2013, VicePresident of the European
Commission Neelie Kroes
signed an agreement with the
‘5G Infrastructure Partnership’ to usher in a new era in
mobile network development.
The Partnership is an industry
association comprising publicprivate partners (the so-called
5G-PPP) and was represented
at the signing by Hossein Moiin,
Executive Vice-President of
Technology and Innovation at
Nokia Solutions and Networks,
and Markus Weldon, President
of Alcatel Lucent’s Bell Labs.
The Commission has set aside
up to €700 million in public
funding to develop the next
generation of ubiquitous 5G
communication systems during its seven-year Horizon
2020 programme. For its part,
the private sector has agreed
an ambitious set of key performance indicators (KPIs)
to leverage this public stake –
seeking a five-fold return on
investment – and will support
the Commission in analysing
the effectiveness of the resulting research effort.
Key to the success of the
5G-PPP will be its ability to

integrate various technologies and stakeholder groups.
The 5G-PPP receives valuable
support from the Net!Works
European Technology Platform (ETP), a research thinktank with around 1,000 members.
It is predicted that by 2020
there will be more than 30 times
as much mobile internet traffic
as there was in 2010. This will
not be the same type of traffic as now - Internet usage will
not only have grown thanks to
the number of smartphones &
tablets in use, but also because
of the massive growth in
machines and sensors using the
Internet to communicate, and
which require more efficient
and ubiquitous technology to
carry the data traffic.
5G is a new network technology and infrastructure that will
bring the capacities needed
to cope with this increased
growth in the use of communication - especially wireless
- technologies by humans and
by machines. 5G will not just
mean faster networks, it will
bring new functionalities and
applications with high social
and economic value.
We will be looking in more
detail at the future of 5G and
the work of the European
Commission in future issues.
Please visit www.ec.europa.eu/
digital-agenda for more information from the European
Commission. 

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The Journal of mHealth