Abstract
Mobile networks are a key element of today’s society enabling communication, access and information sharing. Mobile traffic forecasts agree in predicting that the demand for capacity will grow exponentially over the next years, mainly due to video services. In addition, services in high priority areas for our society such as education, health, government, public safety and transportation are increasingly expected to rely on a mobile infrastructure. Fifth generation mobile networks (5G) aim at addressing the demands and business contexts of networks for 2020 and beyond. This talk will provide an overview of challenges for mobile networks towards 5G and describe relevant R&D activities in the mobile RAN, Transport and Core areas.

Bio
Xavier Costa-Pérez is Head of 5G Networks R&D at NEC Laboratories Europe, where he manages several projects focused on 5G mobile core, backhaul/fronthaul and access networks. He is a 5GPPP Technology Board member and the Technical Manager of the 5G-Crosshaul project. His team contributes to NEC projects for products roadmap evolution as well as to European Commission R&D collaborative projects and has received several NEC’s R&D Awards for successful technology transfers. In addition, the 5G team contributes to related standardization bodies: 3GPP, BBF, ETSI NFV, ETSI MEC and IETF. Xavier has served on the Program Committees of several conferences (including IEEE Greencom, WCNC, and INFOCOM), published at top research venues and holds over 20 patents. He received both his M.Sc. and Ph.D. degrees in Telecommunications from the Polytechnic University of Catalonia (UPC) and was the recipient of a national award for his Ph.D. thesis.