A 5G New Radio for Balanced and Mixed IoT Use Cases: Challenges and Key Enablers in FR1 Band

5G cellular networks are designed to address the need for increased bandwidth of end users (eMBB services), high-reliability and low-latency of critical industrial use cases (URLLC), and long-range, low-power connectivity of machine-type IoT applications (mMTC). To meet such contrasting requirements, 5G networks rely on its new radio interface (5G-NR) to address eMBB and URLLC services and on LTE-M and NB-IoT for mMTC services. As of Release 16, 5G networks effectively support the extreme ends of key performance indicators, namely bandwidth, reliability, latency, coverage, and autonomy. This article analyzes the gap between those capabilities and the requirements of use cases as discussed in the NR-REDCAP 3GPP Study Item of Release 17: video surveillance, industrial IoT, and wearables, to name a few. This article further discusses the challenges driving the design of this new air interface for reduced-capability 5G devices in the sub-6 GHz band and key enablers to fulfill those use case requirements.