Vodafone Germany announced the establishment of a 5G R&D facility in the city of Dresden, in the state of Saxony.
Vodafone said that the new center will focus on research and development into technologies such as 5G and future 6G systems, as well as specific applications in the fields of autonomous driving, connected agriculture, chemistry and construction, and OpenRAN.
Vodafone said its new research center will generate more than 200 highly qualified jobs over the next few years.
In January 2021, Vodafone Group had launched an international competition in which eight European cities, selected in advance, could apply to host the new R&D facility.
“In 2020, as Vodafone, we brought 5G to Germany for the first time. And from 2021 we now want to develop 6G in Dresden from Germany for the world. Our signal for this country: The future of digitization is being devised in Germany,” said Hannes Ametsreiter, CEO of Vodafone Germany.
“The interaction of numerous companies, institutes and startups makes Dresden one of the leading high-tech locations in Europe. Vodafone’s decision underlines this twice again…Our excellent universities train talented people in demand around the world, especially in the MINT [mathematics, informatics, natural sciences and technology] subjects, who now have another very attractive opportunity on site,” said Dirk Hilbert, Mayor of Dresden.
Vodafone Germany recently said its 5G network is now available to more than 25 million people across the country.
In a release, the telco said it plans to continue to expand the mobile network through more than 7,000 construction projects, including 3,000 5G projects to activate 9,000 antennas. The company aims to service over 30 million people with 5G in Germany by the end of this year. Vodafone had originally announced that it would reach around 20 million people with 5G by the end of 2021.
In April, Vodafone Germany had launched its 5G standalone (SA) network in partnership with Ericsson, Nokia, Qualcomm and OPPO.
Vodafone upgraded 1,000 sites to SA 5G, covering 170 cities and municipalities via 3.5 GHz spectrum. The new network was initially launched in some major cities including Frankfurt, Berlin, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Munich and Düsseldorf.
The telco said that it aims to have 4,000 live sites in the 5G SA network by the end of the year.
Vodafone initially launched its 5G network in Germany in 2019, on 3.5 GHz frequencies that it acquired from Telefónica in 2018.
