3GPP Melbourne conference agenda released

The final agenda for this month’s important 3GPP/University of Melbourne mission-critical communications briefing has been released.

A joint initiative of the 3GPP and the university’s Centre for Disaster Management and Public Safety (CDMPS), the event will give Australian policymakers, academics and industry representatives the opportunity to meet and deliberate on communications matters.

Several leaders from the 3GPP will be present to discuss the future direction of mission-critical communications standards, including the impact of 5G.

3GPP is developing a specific set of mission-critical standards to provide the world’s public safety and security agencies with a broadband communications capability that will enable these agencies to gather, analyse and share information at a scale never before seen to keep our communities safe.

3GPP unites seven of the world’s telecommunications standard development organisations to provide a stable environment in which to define the open standards underpinning current and future mobile cellular networks.

Detailed agenda

The event will commence with a short introduction from convenor Euan Ferguson (Co-Chair CDMPS and Centre for Spatial Data Infrastructures & Land Administration Advisory Board, University of Melbourne) and Steven Tsikaris (Executive, Infrastructure and Infrastructure Contracting, Victorian Government Department of Treasury and Finance).

This will be followed by an update on the status of public safety mobile broadband (PSMB) in Australia, presented by Luke Brown (Assistant Secretary, Emergency Management Australia, Department of Home Affairs).

The keynote address will be given by Adrian Scrase (ETSI Chief Technology Officer and Chair of the 3GPP Mobile Competence Centre). He will provide an introduction to the standardisation ecosystem for different generations of global mobile systems, and how standards development organisations are evolving to face new challenges.

Next will be a presentation by Georg Mayer (Chairman, 3GPP Core Network and Terminals), who will speak on why the mission-critical communications industry is interested in 3GPP. He will also provide a 3GPP standards update as it relates to mission-critical PSMB, and pose the question “How will service-based architectures and networks meet the future needs of mission-critical communications?”

The next session will see Tero Pesonen (TCCA Director and board member and Chairman of the Critical Communications Broadband Group) present on the topic of the global Mission Critical Push To Talk (MCPTT) Interoperability Regime and Mission Critical Open Platform (MCOP). His presentation will cover mission-critical broadband and conformance testing, MCOP source code for MCPTT apps and software development, and the importance of interoperability work and future conformance testing to standards.

The last session prior to the afternoon break will see Balazs Bertenyi (Chair, 3GPP Radio Access Networks) speak about the evolution from LTE-Advanced Pro to 5G for mission-critical use, including information on Release 15, LTE and 5G New Radio (NR) status and development, and how Release 16 NR work will bring in more mission-critical use cases.

The final sessions will commence with a presentation by Greg Foliente (Enterprise Professor and Deputy Director, CDMPS, Melbourne School of Engineering), who will speak about the emerging relationship between the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and critical communications.

He will be followed by Tero Pesonen again, who will talk about the evolution from mission-critical narrowband to broadband, including hybrid solutions and other operating models.

Ian Miller (Executive Officer, ARCIA) will then present on the important topic of spectrum allocation in Australia for radio and wireless communications.

The final session will take the form of a Q&A panel session, with the panel comprising Adrian Scrase, Georg Mayer, Balazs Bertenyi, Tero Pesonen, Steve Tsikaris, David Hutton (Director of Technology, GSMA) and Markku Korkiakoski (TCCA CCBG/BIG member, Director in the Finnish Information Security Cluster and industry coordinator for the Security and Software Engineering Research Center). Amongst the topics to be discussed will be:

• Desired outcomes and benefits from Australian engagement and interaction with international bodies such as 3GPP
• Where does Australia fit in the global system?
• Implications and opportunities for Australian engineering, education and research flowing from the development of 3GPP Standards
   

As you can see, the event has a very packed and interesting program, making it a must-attend for all those involved in mission-critical communications in Australia. This is a rare opportunity to meet with senior representatives from the 3GPP, as well as other local and international experts and leaders.

The briefing is on in less than two weeks, so don’t delay — register today.

Save the date

The 3GPP/CDMPS briefing is the first of its type in Australia and it therefore presents a unique opportunity to hear directly from the 3GPP leadership about the current status and strategic direction for standards, including future 5G plans.

Date: Tuesday, 18 September 2018
Time: 1.15 to 5.00 pm
Venue: Room 108, Greenwood Theatre, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, University of Melbourne, Grattan Street, Parkville
Registration: https://www.eventbrite.com.au/e/3gpp-insights-on-global-mobile-telecommunications-tickets-48583571771

Image courtesy Nokia.

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