The UK Department for Digital, Culture, Media & Sport (DCMS) has announced a funding boost of £28.3m to nine projects under the second window of the 5G Create competition.
The funding comprises £15.2m from the DCMS, while the remaining £13.1m will come from project partners.
According to the DCMS, the joint investment from government and businesses will enable in capturing the benefits of 5G and help British industries.
The winners are Milton Keynes 5G (MK5G), Eden Universe (OpenRAN), Connected Cowes (OpenRAN), 5G AMC 2 (OpenRAN), Live and Wild: Filming with 5G (OpenRAN), Project Vista, The Green Planet AR, 5G Ports – Port of Felixstowe, and 5G Logistics (OpenRAN).
Five of these winning projects will evaluate the technical feasibilities of Open RAN, which is an alternative approach to building telecoms networks that enable greater interoperability of radio equipment between vendors. Besides, OPEN RAN will provide operators with increased choice and flexibility as they launch 5G infrastructure.
The Milton Keynes 5G project has won a funding of £2.4m for evaluating 5G applications at Stadium MK. It will carry out trials to showcase how 5G applications can empower major venues to increase efficiency and deliver enhanced experiences for visitors and also staff in the future.
Project Vista won funding of £1.3m for leveraging 5G for delivering next-generation viewing experiences for event spectators. This, it plans to do so by offering live multi-angle HD video streams and interactive content produced from the event directly to devices in stadia and across Britain.
The Green Planet AR project won funding of £2.2m for showcasing additional ways that 5G benefits the public by developing an entertaining augmented reality (AR) app for mobile phones.
On the other hand, 5G Ports – Port of Felixstowe won funding of £1.6m for assessing the potential of 5G across two use cases. One is for enabling remote-controlled cranes through the transmission of CCTV and the other being using of internet of things sensors and artificial intelligence for streamlining the predictive maintenance cycle of the 31 quay-side and 82-yard cranes of the Port of Felixstowe.
UK Minister for Digital Infrastructure Matt Warman said: “5G is about so much more than faster mobile internet speeds so we’re investing millions to help some of Britain’s brightest innovators explore the huge potential of the technology to improve and enrich our lives.
“The projects we’ve selected will demonstrate how the blistering speeds of 5G can put some rocket fuel in our economy and help businesses bounce back from the pandemic.”
In July 2020, the DCMS selected six research and development projects for combined funding of £30m under the first window of the 5G Create competition.
The open competition is part of the broader £200m worth 5G Testbeds and Trials programme (5GTT).
