The 3GPP kicked off the final meeting to complete its mobile 5G standard, aiming to nail down a handful of key specifications ahead of the standard’s expected approval in June.

Around 1,500 vendor and operator contributors, from companies including Samsung, Qualcomm, Verizon, AT&T, NTT DoCoMo, KT and SK Telecom gathered in Busan, South Korea to put the finishing touches on the standard at a meeting running from 21 May to 25 May.

Among other things, Samsung (which is hosting the meeting) said in a statement the working groups will decide the radio performance requirements for 5G terminals and base stations, including for the 3.5GHz and 28GHz bands.

Completion of the standalone 5G standard at this meeting follows 3GPP’s approval of a non-standalone 5G New Radio (NR) specification in December 2017, which allows operators to add a 5G layer to their existing 4G LTE networks. The standalone standard will specify full user and control plane capabilities for 5G NR, allowing operators to launch pure 5G networks.

Samsung noted the finalised requirements will help inform radio regulations for 5G launches in countries including Korea, the US and Japan.

Regulators in the US and Korea have scheduled auctions of 5G spectrum for later this year, ahead of expected mobile 5G launches from operators in both countries in late 2018 and 2019.