InterDigital’s Service-Based Architecture Forms Heart Of 5G Media Experiences Competition

Posted by InterDigital

InterDigital, a mobile and video technology research and development company, today highlights its involvement in the recent “Urban Hacking in 5G” event in Bristol (17th-20th June). The event saw competing creative software teams use 5G technology, specifically mobile edge computing, to design and implement applications that deliver new media experiences within urban settings.

The 5G technology for the event was provided by FLAME – Facility for Large-scale Adaptive Media Experimentation – a European H2020 project, which seeks to transform the user experience by delivering faster access to media and new services through 5G.

InterDigital provided its Service-Based Architecture (SBA) solution at the heart of the FLAME platform. The SBA solution utilizes InterDigital’s FLIPS (Flexible IP Services) technology suite to combine multicast technology with content caching and enables HTTP requests to be flexibly routed on top of an SDN-based transport network. By using FLIPS, latency can be dramatically reduced and throughput increased, resulting in higher resource efficiency and speed of delivery for IP-based services. This SBA solution has recently been included as one of three possible deployment choices for 3GPP’s enhanced SBA in the current Release 16 specification.

The event was designed to create a sustainable Future Media Internet ecosystem through innovation embedded on the 5GUK Test Network infrastructure. Software teams were challenged to create inclusive, participative and entertainment experiences that could potentially be enjoyed by the public.

In addition to providing its SBA solution as part of the FLAME platform during the event, InterDigital also sponsored the event’s awards. First place was awarded to the ‘Aces’ team who proposed an innovative application idea intended to enable a two-way conversation between users and their environment, such as an immersive tourist experience of the city throughout history.

Dirk Trossen, Senior Principal Engineer at InterDigital Europe, said “As mobile network operators begin their 5G deployments, attention now turns to the applications and services that will run on them. Events like these are crucial in validating the underlying infrastructure and demonstrating many new exciting use cases. We are delighted that we were able to play such an important role in this 5G test-bed, and foster innovation for 5G services and applications of the future.”

The use of InterDigital’s SBA in this event follows similar recent deployments. In March, the SBA solution was used in a smart tourism showcase in Bristol in collaboration with 360° Virtual Reality (VR) platform provider Mativision, which saw a group of users experience a guided city tour of a designated site through VR headsets running on 5G technology. It was also used in a trial which saw Belgian broadcaster VRT conduct a media trial with user-generated content for next generation media reporting.―CT Bureau