Outlook 33 : WWRF contributions towards IMT-2030

With the evolution of information and communications technologies, IMT-2030 is expected to support enriched and immersive experience, enhanced ubiquitous coverage, and enable new forms of collaboration. Furthermore, IMT-2030 is envisaged to support expanded and new usage scenarios compared to those of IMT-2020, while providing enhanced and new capabilities. ITU Working Party (WP) 5D has identified the importance of understanding the technology trends and developing a vision of the technologies required as we move to a future connected society, beyond IMT-2020. In 2021, WP 5D started the work on “IMT towards 2030 and beyond” by applying the well-proven IMT-process, which has already been implemented for IMT-2000, IMT-Advanced and IMT-2020. The WWRF has an active working group in this area. This “IMT-2030 Vision Group” of WWRF focuses on research that looks five to ten years ahead to meet the requirements in the year 2030 and beyond. The group investigates the gaps in the provision of IMT2020 requirements that would need to be filled. The IMT-2030 Vision group also explores the potential of novel technologies that could revolutionize the wireless evolution. The WWRF “IMT-2030 Vision Group” has contributed since the beginning of the IMT2030 works in ITU to the determination of clear requirements of future communication systems and towards the identification of necessary research areas. The objective of this Outlook publication is to provide guidelines on the framework and overall objectives of the future development of IMT-2030 (aka “6G”). The vision group has also studied emerging use cases and novel business models to justify investments that will be needed. As a priority, this vision group has also studied the requirements of the digitally disadvantaged sections of society and geographical regions, which have yet to experience the value of connecting to the Wireless World