LONDON: India today signed three memorandum of understanding with three top UK academic institutions to facilitate meaningful exploration and early adoption of 5G technology.
The MOUs were signed between representatives of King's College, University of Surrey, University of Bristol and Vipin Tyagi, Executive Director of C-DOT, a government-owned body engaged in research and development in the field of telecommunications in India.
The focus of the engagement between C-DOT and the universities will be to set up use-case labs to explore new scenarios for 5G, promote awareness and understanding of 5G, support the creation of 5G test beds, conduct field trials and evolve solutions for the Indian context.
5G is the next step from the currently deployed 4G telecom technologies in the world.
The agreements were signed at the India House in presence of India's minister of state for communications Manoj Sinha and High Commissioner to the UK Y K Sinha.
"It is a win-win situation for both C-DOT and the three universities. The Government of India is fully committed to ensuring that we march in step with the world, and be among the leaders to accelerate the exploration, adoption, and full-scale deployment of 5G technology for the benefit of our citizens," Sinha said after the signing ceremony.
"The signing of these agreements with premier academic institutions in the UK is an important milestone for us. We expect this strong partnership to produce accelerated outcomes that benefit both our great countries," he told reporters.
In addition to drastically improving speeds for broadband users, it is expected to have a significant impact on new verticals such as transport, smart cities, health, manufacturing, railways, public safety and power, an official release said.
Application of innovation such as Machine Learning (ML), Artificial Intelligence (AI) and deployment of Mobile Edge Computing (MEC) will change the nature of telecom networks by allowing for a much larger number of devices to be connected and managed in a 5G network.
With the MOUs signed, C-DOT will get access to leading experts and labs associated technologies in the UK universities.
The UK universities will be able to participate in the on-going establishment of 5G test beds in India which can inter-work with the test-beds in the UK.