3GPP Released 16 New 5G Specifications

The 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) announced the freeze of Release 16 NR Specifications, marking the completion of the first evolutionary release of 5G technologies. Release 16 was finalized on schedule thanks to the collective hard work and close collaboration of global industries. It should further boost the confidence and resolution of industrial partners towards the continuous evolution of 5G technologies and lay a solid foundation for opening up a fully-connected, intelligent world.

This is the first time ever that 3GPP has ratified a technological standardization outside of physical meetings. With daunting challenges arising from the ongoing pandemic worldwide, global industry partners united as one to jointly complete the evolutionary release of 5G specifications, Release 16 NR, with an excellent quality.

Release 16 highlights not only 5G's continued enhancement in terms of high bandwidth and low latency, but also its extended applicability to a wide range of vertical industries, as well as new features designed to increase network performance and deployment efficiencies. More than 20 standard technological features were newly added, including a series of improvements for enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB) and vertical applications. These eMBB improvements cover Massive MIMO, cell interruption-free handover, and remote interference suppression. A number of technologies are also specially consolidated for vertical industries, such as ultra-reliable low-latency communication (URLLC), NR vehicle to everything (V2X), non-public networking (NPN), and positioning.

In particular, codebook enhancement, multi-TRP transmission, uplink full-power transmission, and low peak-to-average demodulation reference signal (DMRS) along with other technologies are adopted to enhance Massive MIMO performance in eMBB use cases. Through scheduling-free transmission enhancement and other technological combinations, URLLC will offer more robust support for smart grids, V2X, manufacturing automation, and many other vertical applications. For NR-based V2X, NR sidelink is defined to implement the stringent latency and reliability requirements for platooning, advanced driving.

Globally, 5G has ushered in a new stage of scaled rollout. As the product of collaboration and knowledge from all industry partners, Release 16 NR is the 5G standard specifications that will provide a high performance and full-service support well into the future. It will meet expectations and play an essential role in promoting digital transformation across various industries.