June 13, 2017

By Georg Mayer, 3GPP CT Chairman

The latest Plenary meeting of the Core Network and Terminals Technical Specification Group (CT TSG), held last week in West Palm Beach, Florida, has seen good progress in the Working Group’s study phase on 5G.

Existing & new protocols for the service based architecture (SBA), network slicing, Policy and Charging Control (PCC) as well as mobility and session management and many other features are currently under evaluation in a number of new 3GPP Technical Reports:

• TR 24.890 - CT WG1 aspects of 5G System Phase 1
• TR 29.890 - CT WG3 aspects of 5G System Phase 1
• TR 29.891 - CT WG4 aspects of 5G System Phase 1
• TR 31.890 - CT WG6 aspects of 5G System Phase 1

Besides that, the following, new, Release 15 Work Items were agreed. These are features that will immediately progress in to the normative phase:

• EPC enhancements to support 5G New Radio via Dual Connectivity [EDCE5-CT] 
• IMS impact due to 5GS IP-CAN [IMSo5G] 
• Northbound APIs for SCEF – SCS/AS Interworking [NAPS-CT] 
• 3GPP PS data off function – Phase 2 [PS_DATA_OFF2-CT] 
• Complementary Features for voice services over WLAN [VoWLAN-CT]
• Inclusion of WLAN direct discovery technologies as an alternative for ProSe direct discovery [ProSe_WLAN_DD_Stage3]
• Enhanced Calling Name Service [eCNAM-CT] 
• SAE Protocol Development [SAES6, SAES6-CSFB, SAES6-non3GPP]

More Cooperation ahead

We have invested a considerable amount of effort, during the last few months, to coordinate protocol related collaborations between IETF and 3GPP on 5G issues. These activities will be further progressed at the upcoming IETF meeting (Prague, July 2017) and 3GPP CT WG meetings.

Release 14 deadline looms

With exception on some minor issues in the Mission Critical area, all Rel-14 open issues were closed during the last three months. Therefore, besides MC services, Rel-14 is now 100% complete. With this 3GPP has finished all work which leads towards the 5th generation of mobility. 

Note to readers:

Georg Mayer will be speaking at the following conferences – on the theme of the next generation core and on protocols for 5G networks:

• Autonomous Machines World - 26-27/June/2017, Berlin
• Broadband World Forum – 24-26/October/2017, Berlin 
• He also is a member of the Roll2Rail Project's Wireless TCMS Advisory Group, which will meet in Brussels on June 28, 2018
• See a recording of Georg's presentation to the ETSI 5G SUMMIT 2017, on the 5G infrastructure work in 3GPP