A group of European broadcasters plus Rohde & Schwarz are working toward the use of 5G Broadcast
The 5G Broadcast Strategic Task Force, made up of broadcasters from a number of European broadcasting markets and supported by testing and broadcast technology company Rohde & Schwarz, is working on a joint commercial roadmap that would put the technology in play by 2027, according to R&S.
The 5BSTF group was started in late 2024 by Germany’s Media Broadcast broadcasting company and TDF of France, plus Rohde & Schwarz. Other participating broadcasters include Cordiant Capital from the U.K., Poland’s Emitel (which is owned by Cordiant Capital), Czech Republic-based CRA, BTCY of Belgium and Italy’s RAI.
The group has outlined a plan consisting of “three Sprints” that is aimed at “developing Value Propositions for OEMs” while positioning 5G Broadcast as market-ready and to “pave the way towards the first commercial networks,” according to an R&S press release.
The first Sprint has been completed, with 5BSTF members reaching population coverage of 125 million residents across Germany, France, Italy, Poland, the Czech Republic, and Belgium. The broadcast network operators “are prepared to transform part of their existing infrastructure into 5G Broadcast network connectivity” in order to deliver services “mainly focusing on live and linear audiovisual content that has an existing base of loyal fans and subscribers,” the release said, adding that “5BSTF members identify a completely new addressable market projected to emerge from Q2 2027” based on the use of 5G Broadcast.
Rohde touted 5G Broadcast as providing multimedia services with lower latency and guaranteed quality of service, combined with “exceptional … video quality” for smartphones and tablets as well as a ” simplified and flat infrastructure having a minimum impact on the environment with minimum CO2 emissions” plus less battery drain on devices. The test company also said that there are several mobile OEMs that are looking at the 5G Broadcast market and conducting “extensive field trials utilizing readily available commercial devices.”
In other test news:
–Keysight Technologies has added AI capabilities to its network packet brokers (NPBs) for cybersecurity, which it is calling AI Insight Brokers. The NPBs are “designed to improve the performance of AI-driven cybersecurity operations such as threat detection, incident response, and forensics,” the company said, and purpose-built to leverage AI software including Keysight’s new AI Stack for network visibility.
“Industry-leading security vendors are continuing to rely on AI to accelerate threat detection and response. Our AI Insight Brokers go beyond traditional packet brokers to work hand in hand with this, by processing data at the network edge,” said Recep Ozdag, VP and GM of Network Visibility Solutions at Keysight. “This reduces the load on security tools and dramatically speeds analysis. With the ability to now run AI software, we can offer customers an enhanced product that will continue to meet evolving security needs.”
–Viavi Solutions is boosting its field test instruments’ 800G capabilities, in a nod to the increasing demand for speed and capacity—particularly for metro/core networks and data center interconnects, driven by increasing artificial intelligence workloads.
“As emerging applications such as IoT, AI and cloud computing place unprecedented strain on networks, technicians and engineers need fast and accurate certification of data center cablings for 800G,” said Kevin Oliver, VP and GM of Fiber and Access Solutions at Viavi Solutions. “Offering comprehensive testing, optics form factor flexibility and extensive support for coherent pluggable optics in a single unit, the new transport module is optimized for 800G testing in the field.”
The 800G transport module for the OneAdvisor 800 will be highlighted at the upcoming Optical Fiber Communication (OFC) Conference in the first week of April.
–Anritsu is expanding the frequency range support of Vector Signal Generator MG3710E up to 44 GHz in partnership with TMY Technology, aka TMYTEK, using the latter company’s frequency converters, for 5G and satellite applications.
–ECSite has added a module for public safety networks to its ECSig Cloud-Enabled CW Test Transmitter, enabling the transmitter to specifically support low frequencies from 140 MHz to 500 MHz including UHF/VHF. This means that the ECSig now addresses frequencies from 140 MHz – 4000 MHz, the company noted.
The test transmitter is used by field engineers to do uplink/downlink continuous wave (CW) testing and coverage validation across 4G and 5G distributed antenna system (DAS) networks, according to ECSite, and now it can also be used for testing of public safety infrastructure.
–Valens Semiconductor said this week that it hosted interoperability testing with seven other vendors of the MIPI A-PHY physical layer interface for automotive. The company called the successful interoperability testing “a key step towards broad adoption of A-PHY in China” which also “signals significant momentum of this technology for the global automotive industry.”
The seven other vendors participating in the interoperabilty testing were Analogix, ESWIN Technology, Motorcomm, OmniVision Technologies, Silergy, SimChip and Velink.
