Vodafone Group announced a partnership with Dresden University of Technology in Germany to expand its existing 5G network technology research programme.

The operator group and university aim to bring together academics, developer and technology companies to examine the potential of 5G technology and to create technical guidelines for its development.

Dresden University has opened a 5G lab, where it has facilities including network hardware and software, chipsets, spectrum and cloud computing infrastructure.

Vodafone is working with other universities, such as Kings College London and Carnegie Mellon University in the US, along with technology companies and industry groups to drive 5G development.

Along with EE and Telefonica, it was one of a number of industry players to throw its weight behind the 5G Innovation Centre (5GIC) at the University of Surrey in November last year.

A Vodafone statement claimed experts predict 5G technology will boost speeds, resilience and intelligence of mobile networks. However, there is a great deal of hype around the subject, especially given the fact that an official 5G standard is unlikely to be ratified for at least another two years.

“Today, mobile communications is all about moving content from one place to another. Tomorrow it will be about being able to control a vast array of objects in real-time with little human intervention. To get there we need to rethink wireless communications, particularly with regard to data rates, latency and IP services,” noted Professor Gerhard Fettweis, the Vodafone chair of mobile communications systems at the Dresden University of Technology, in the Vodafone statement.

He added that with support from Vodafone and other partners, Dresden “is well positioned to lead a cross-industry effort to find answers to some of these challenging questions”.