Audi, BMW, others partner with telecommunications players to launch global cross-industry 5G Automotive Association

AUDI AG, BMW Group, Daimler AG, Ericsson, Huawei, Intel, Nokia and Qualcomm Inc., announced Tuesday formation of the “5G Automotive Association”. The association will develop, test and promote communications solutions, support standardization and accelerate commercial availability and global market penetration.

The goal is to address society’s connected mobility and road safety needs with applications such as connected automated driving, ubiquitous access to services and integration into smart cities and intelligent transportation.

The main activities of the association include defining and harmonizing use cases, technical requirements and implementation strategies; supporting standardization and regulatory bodies, certification and approval processes; addressing vehicle-to-everything technology requirements, such as wireless connectivity, security, privacy, authentication, and distributed cloud architectures; and running joint innovation and development projects leading to integrated solutions, interoperability testing, large scale pilots and trial deployments.

The 5G Automotive Association is a global association and welcomes more partners who are engaged in the automotive industry, the ICT industry or the broader eco-system and value chain for vehicle and road transportation systems. Several companies have already expressed strong support for the 5GAA and declared their intent to join the Association in the near future.

Christoph Voigt is appointed Chairperson of the Board and Dino Flore is appointed Director General of the Association. The Association will support and work in close cooperation with national and regional initiatives, such as the European Connected & Automated Driving Pre-Deployment Project.

With next generation 5G mobile networks and continued strong LTE evolution, which includes Cellular Vehicle-to-everything (C-V2X) communication, the focus of information and communication technologies (ICT) shifts towards the Internet of Things and the digitalization of industries.

As an evolution to existing networks, next generation mobile networks are expected to handle much more data volume, connect many more devices, significantly reduce latency and bring new levels of reliability. For example, 5G can better support mission-critical communications for safer driving and will further support enhanced vehicle-to-everything communications and connected mobility solutions.

These new solutions bring new technological and business opportunities for both the automotive and ICT industries, and the members of the association will closely collaborate to realize the full potential together. The association will address key technical and regulatory issues, leveraging next generation mobile networks and integrating vehicle platforms with connectivity, networking and computing solutions.

“Connected cars will shape the future of individual mobility, and next generation mobile networks will take car to x connectivity to a new level,” said Alfons Pfaller, Head of Infotainment Development, AUDI AG. “The key to success is in cross-industry collaboration. This is why we set up the 5G Automotive Association where experts from all relevant fields are teaming up.”

“We expect 5G to become the worldwide dominating mobile communications standard of the next decade. For the automotive industry it is essential that 5G fulfills the challenges of the era of digitalization and autonomous driving,” said Dr. Christoph Grote, senior vice president for electronics for BMW. “With the 5G Automotive Association we founded a cross-industry forum that allows us to shape the future 5G technology with leading ICT companies. As a co-founder of the 5G Automotive Association we would be excited to welcome further partners engaged in the automotive industry, the information and communication technologies or mobile network operators in the association.”

“The connected car enables us to offer our customers services, both inside and outside the vehicle, which make their daily routine tasks easier, increase comfort and safety and thus create considerable added value,” said Sajjad Khan, Director Digital Vehicle & Mobility, Daimler AG. “The fundamental basis for this is a reliable and fast connectivity technology whose standards have global validity. Together with the other founding members of the “5G Automotive Association”, we as Daimler AG are working on precisely that – with the aim of raising car connectivity as well to a new level with the advent of the next generation of mobile phone technology.”


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