5G: finalising the job, finding and creating skills

This is the fourth year for “5G Italy”, the conference dedicated to a technology that will provide the connectivity and services necessary for the digital transformation of our country. In the past years, we have addressed several topics related to 5G, which are still of interest:

• its ability to provide diversified services, designed for different classes of applications and non-human users
• its potential to have a positive impact in every sector: agriculture, commerce, defence, energy, finance, industry, media, public administration, health, security, transportation, tourism, etc.
• the skill gap issue, which must be addressed by acting on three fronts: attracting people from abroad, training people from nearby sectors; attracting more students to both technical and professional schools and universities
• the issue of the lack of antenna sites and more generally of the scarce electromagnetic “space”, that is the limitations to emit with the desired power due to constraints and crowding of operators; here it is necessary to act by simplifying and speeding up the authorization and implementation processes; densifying sites where useful, for current and future needs; limiting the number of antennas on the same site, improving their aesthetics to reduce visual impact; decreasing, as a result of densification, the electromagnetic field levels and therefore opening up new spaces.

This year we are adding the theme of network completion towards stand-alone solutions, thus deploying the full potential of 5G: not only the radio interface, but also its software core network and cloud/edge-cloud components, both needed to enable advanced services. Finally, we begin to talk about 6G.

In this scenario, the opportunity of the Recovery and Resilience Plan stands out, which offers the tools to solve several critical issues in our sector, if we use them well and if we coordinate the different foreseen investments, something that at the moment is not given much attention. At its completion, the plan should pay back the investments made and leave us with concrete and lasting results, including: activation of sustainable virtuous circles for whole sectors, structural improvement of the research&development in our sector; the strengthening of the link between scientific excellence and business; an improvement in the ability to use TLCs in a wide range of sectors; the digital transformation and increased business efficiency of our industry; the creation of new companies; the increase of the company’s average size.

In addition to the main conference, 5G Italy also includes a PhD school, scientific sessions and, new this year, “CNIT conversations”, short technical discussions between two/three experts. The ”5G Italy White Book”, which provides a description of the many aspects of 5G technology, and the “CNIT talks”, short tutorials on 5G and 6G issues, remain available on our website from the previous edition.

CNIT (https://www.cnit.it/en/) is honoured by the participation to this event of authorities and qualified representatives of organizations and companies in the sector and hopes that it will contribute to further stimulate the interest of our country towards this fundamental technology and more in general to the Telecommunications sector, an essential component of our society.

The Director of CNIT (https://www.cnit.it/en/)
Nicola Blefari Melazzi, Università di Roma Tor Vergata (https://blefari.eln.uniroma2.it/en/)