Keysight Technologies has joined forces with sixteen organisations to create 6G-SANDBOX, a pan-European testbed for 6G experimentation and validation of 5G-Advanced and 6G capabilities. As a part of 6G-SANDBOX, Keysight will act as the project coordinator.
Funded by Horizon Europe, 6G-SANDBOX is one of 35 new projects launched by Smart Networks and Services Joint Undertaking (SNS JU), which the European Commission (EC) established in 2021 to support the development of smart communication components, systems and networks considered essential in building out a first-class European supply chain for advanced 5G and 6G technologies. The project aims to develop EU-wide experimentation platforms to test promising technical 6G enablers, including zero-touch management, flexible multi-tenancy architecture, network intelligence, security, digital twins, artificial intelligence (AI) and reconfigurable intelligent surfaces.
The 6G testbed will combine digital and physical nodes to deliver fully configurable, manageable, and controllable end-to-end networks for validating new technologies and research advancements for 6G. The project offers organisations opportunities to conduct trials at four experimental platforms located in Malaga, Spain; Berlin, Germany; Oulu, Finland; and Athens, Greece.
“As an open 6G experimentation environment, 6G-SANDBOX will underpin an accelerated pan-European green and digital transformation, in line with the United Nation’s sustainable development goals (SDGs),” said Michael Dieudonne, 6G-SANDBOX Project Coordinator, representing Keysight.
The 6G-SANDBOX project participants include: COSMOTE; Eurescom; FOGUS Innovations & Services P.C.; Fraunhofer FOKUS; INFOLYSIS P.C.; Institute of Software Engineering and Technologies (ITIS) at the University of Malaga; Keysight Technologies Inc.; Lenovo; National Centre for Scientific Research (NCSR) Demokritos; Nokia eXtended Reality Lab; OpenNebula; OWO; Queen’s University Belfast; Telefonica, and University of Oulu.
“Experimentally driven research has been at the forefront of European innovation of new networks. Testbeds enable the trial and evaluation of service concepts, technologies, system solutions, and business models to a point where risks associated with launching these commercially are minimised. Therefore, Eurescom firmly believes that operational 6G testbeds, such as 6G-SANDBOX, need to be an inherent part of the 6G ecosystem for the industry to innovate,” said Anastasius Gavras, Programme Manager at Eurescom.
