5G Standard Development: Technology and Roadmap

The wireless cellular network has been one of the most successful communications technologies of the last three decades. From the fifth generation (5G) technology roadmap perspective, people expect a dual-track approach to take place over the next few years in 3GPP. This chapter focusses on the technologies for the air interface of radio access networks. It is devoted to the standards roadmap from fourth generation (4G) to 5G. The chapter provides an overview of major enabling technologies and a more detailed roadmap of the 5G standard development and its deployment. Since the publication of the Rel-99 standards supporting wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA), a representative 3G technology, 3GPP has been playing an important role in evolving cellular communication standards to 4G, namely LTE and LTE-Advanced. 5G is expected to enhance three major usage scenarios: enhanced mobile broadband (eMBB), massive machine type communications (mMTC) and ultra-reliable and low-latency communications (URLLC).