Periodic Reporting for period 1 - Int5Gent (Integrating 5G enabling technologies in a holistic service to physical layer 5G system platform)
Okres sprawozdawczy: 2020-11-01 do 2022-04-30
The necessity of an enabling 5G infrastructure, from the data plane technology blocks to the control plane and application deployment layer, is of paramount importance, in order to maintain the market penetration momentum of 5G and generate in turn the functional requirements for meeting the expected 5G key performance indicators, thus supporting the creation and growth of truly innovative vertical markets. From the networking point of view, the increasing interest in new use cases with strict latency requirements, fast service deployment times, dynamicity and trustworthiness generates a clear trend towards distributed network models implemented through the edge computing concept. This denotes the deployment of an advanced infrastructure at the access and metro segments, which will be able to provide sufficient data transport connectivity and management of physical and virtualized network functions for a large number of distributed nodes. The complexity increases further by considering different types of edge nodes that may span from simple gateway servers to mini-Datacenters (DCs), thus having different connectivity requirements. From the data plane point of view, the new technology building blocks should enable the 5G network infrastructure to provide high capacity and expandable connectivity between 5G terminals and edge computing nodes as well as among mobile edge, computing and content delivery nodes, and the core infrastructure also supporting the legacy cloud computing level. To this direction, the move towards higher operating bands (V and even D-band), as well the deployment of photonic interconnection solutions is being discussed as highly promising technology enablers, requiring though efficient elements for data distribution and demanding RF electronic system designs. In addition, the service level requirement for low latency combined with the availability of new intelligent processing algorithms at the edge node, denotes the deployment of edge processing units able to handle such services in real time and flexibly in terms of usage of resources.
Within this highly demanding environment, Int5Gent aims to deploy a holistic 5G system platform that combines new technological blocks for the data plane infrastructure orchestrated by flexible PNF-VNF instances over a generalized NFV Infrastructure (NFVI) that is extended to edge computational, storage and networking resources. An overlay application orchestrator for the vertical services allows a pragmatic approach for the services’ deployment, the extraction of analytics and the inclusion of policy criteria. The overall goal is to integrate innovative solutions at different development layer of the 5G stack and combine them optimally in the quest to promote true 5G enabling solutions for new technology and service provisioning vertical markets.
Within this highly demanding environment, Int5Gent aims to deploy a holistic 5G system platform that combines new technological blocks for the data plane infrastructure orchestrated by flexible PNF-VNF instances over a generalized NFV Infrastructure (NFVI) that is extended to edge computational, storage and networking resources. An overlay application orchestrator for the vertical services allows a pragmatic approach for the services’ deployment, the extraction of analytics and the inclusion of policy criteria. The overall goal is to integrate innovative solutions at different development layer of the 5G stack and combine them optimally in the quest to promote true 5G enabling solutions for new technology and service provisioning vertical markets.
Within the first period of the project, Int5Gent has managed to define its reference system architecture and the technical level details of its building blocks and their interfaces. This work was followed by the designing of the project’s use cases and demonstration actions, which will take place in Barcelona and Athens. Concerning the technological blocks supporting the edge/access domains of the Int5Gent architecture, fully functional radio heads for sub-6 GHz based on FPGAs and components-off-the-shelf (COTS) have been developed to support the SDoF deployments. The FPGA cards intended for use in analog RoF interfaces have been designed and initial tests have been carried out. In the edge domain, time synchronization engines have been deployed as part of networking cards providing access to edge resources. Regarding the radio developments, sub-6GHz SDoF-compatible RRU node have been prototyped and will be delivered for real-time testing in SDoF laboratory layout. The mmWave mesh node/client nodes have been also prototyped and have been initially tested for backhauling Int5Gent traffic in core network. D-band radio transceivers have been also designed and prototyped in support of converged fiber-wireless analog RoF interfaces. Regarding the vertical integration activities, specification of requirements and the functional design of the layered Int5Gent orchestration framework have been defined. The preliminary release of the Network Orchestrator including some components that have been developed from scratch and the enhancement and extension of the Network Slice Management Function blocks has been achieved. The Vertical Application Orchestrator has been also extended and enhanced in its engine and both north-bound and south-bound interfaces have been defined. Significant efforts have been directed for the extraction of the required time plan and the integration process as well as the tools and the interfacing among collaborating partners. The work has been significantly updated following the updated architecture and the detailed definition of the building blocks and interfaces has been carried out for the testing scenarios and final use cases’ deployments in Barcelona and in Athens. Moreover, Int5Gent has provided a detailed analysis of the main related standardization and industrial trends relevant to Int5Gent, along with an analysis of how Int5Gent adheres to those standards/trends. The exploitation plan updates have been identified for all potential products which can be commercialized by the Int5Gent consortium, revealing an overall good commercialization potential of the targeted innovations.
Empowered by its ambitious vision, Int5Gent aims to seamlessly interconnect access nodes supporting any type of IoT device and related services over a bandwidth flexible and adaptive fronthaul/backhaul infrastructure and control and manage the network and computational resources, as well as orchestrate the lifecycle of the deployed service functions. More specifically, Int5Gent will:
▪ Develop a mmWave point-to-multipoint (PtMP) mesh node to support the backhaul connectivity where the optical fibers do not exist.
▪ Develop D-band transceivers supporting analog RoF interfaces with practically unlimited fronthaul transport capacities.
▪ Develop a multi-stream bit-interleaved sigma-delta modulated interface for bandwidth-efficient, low-power interconnection between edge box and frequency agnostic 5G RRH nodes.
▪ Edge-Box deployment based on advanced baseband processor platforms for MEC-oriented use cases.
▪ Architect a truly flexible 5G C-RAN with reconfigurable optical fronthaul interfaces for optical access domain of Int5Gent's architecture.
▪ Dynamic application driven orchestration of network slices in distributed 5G infrastructures with edge-fog computing capabilities.
▪ Develop an end-to-end 5G network slicing management and orchestration framework to dynamically reconfigure a multi-technology network at service runtime.
▪ Validate 5G technological blocks in a series of scalable lab- and field-trial demonstrators in Barcelona and Athens targeting service-oriented use cases.
▪ Deliver a holistic roadmap for transforming Int5Gent innovations into business opportunities with strong 5G market potential.
Through its targeted outcomes, Int5Gent aims to support the emergence of a European offer for new 5G core technologies at TRL7 or beyond, support the emergence of new actors in the related markets and create high-tech start-ups or new business opportunities for established SME's.
▪ Develop a mmWave point-to-multipoint (PtMP) mesh node to support the backhaul connectivity where the optical fibers do not exist.
▪ Develop D-band transceivers supporting analog RoF interfaces with practically unlimited fronthaul transport capacities.
▪ Develop a multi-stream bit-interleaved sigma-delta modulated interface for bandwidth-efficient, low-power interconnection between edge box and frequency agnostic 5G RRH nodes.
▪ Edge-Box deployment based on advanced baseband processor platforms for MEC-oriented use cases.
▪ Architect a truly flexible 5G C-RAN with reconfigurable optical fronthaul interfaces for optical access domain of Int5Gent's architecture.
▪ Dynamic application driven orchestration of network slices in distributed 5G infrastructures with edge-fog computing capabilities.
▪ Develop an end-to-end 5G network slicing management and orchestration framework to dynamically reconfigure a multi-technology network at service runtime.
▪ Validate 5G technological blocks in a series of scalable lab- and field-trial demonstrators in Barcelona and Athens targeting service-oriented use cases.
▪ Deliver a holistic roadmap for transforming Int5Gent innovations into business opportunities with strong 5G market potential.
Through its targeted outcomes, Int5Gent aims to support the emergence of a European offer for new 5G core technologies at TRL7 or beyond, support the emergence of new actors in the related markets and create high-tech start-ups or new business opportunities for established SME's.