VALENCIA–Chinese vendor ZTE and Spanish carrier Orange have carried out a number of demonstrations of the potential of 5G technologies in the fields of automation, robotics and entertainment.
The demos were unveiled at the Global 5G event, taking place this week in Valencia, Spain.
The first demo applied 5G technology to remote driving and was carried out with the collaboration of Valencia’s Universitat Politecnica (UPV).
To perform this test, cameras were used to capture high-resolution images of the vehicle’s environment and, through the Orange 5G network, reach the remote driver in real time.
The second demo showed one of the possible applications of 5G technology to the development of Industry 4.0: the handling of industrial robots. The 5G technology eliminates the problems of latency and delay in the transmission of data, which allows the operation of a robotic arm remotely and in real time, ZTE and Orange said.
In this experience, which also involved the participation of the Universitat Politècnica de València, a high-resolution camera collected the movements of the human arm that managed the robot, which were recognized, interpreted and converted into commands that were transmitted instantly to the robot via the 5G network. In this way, the movements are reproduced by the robot in real time.
The partners also demonstrated the use of 3D holographic technology for the broadcast and reception of audiovisual content in real time.
The 5G network trial being used by Orange in the city of Valencia was deployed by ZTE.
Wang Jiayi, Director of 5G RAN Solutions at ZTE Corporation, told reporters that the company has been engaged with Orange Spain to prepare the 5G field trial over the last two years.
“The 5G trial in Valencia was launched last year. We have built a standalone 5G network for this field trial,” the executive said on the sidelines of the 5G event. He added that the network solution includes 5G new radio (5G NR) as well as ZTE’s Common Core solution.
The executive also said that ZTE expected to continue with the 5G trial with Orange throughout the rest of the year in order to complete the two phases of the trial.
In April, Orange Spain and ZTE completed what they claimed was the first voice and data call over a standalone 5G network in Europe.
The trial was carried out in Valencia via a 5G New Radio base station, 5G core network and test devices, reaching speeds of 876 Mbps with a single user handset and 3.2 Gbps with 12 handsets working simultaneously.
Orange Spain highlighted that the network technology was fully 5G, whereas previous 5G calls trials in Spain were made using Non-Standalone (NSA) architecture. Orange Spain plans to extend 5G trials to other industries including construction, energy, health, automotive, and tourism.
In addition to Valencia, Orange is conducting 5G tests in Seville, Málaga, Vigo, Santiago de Compostela, Barcelona and Madrid.
