With political and economic turbulence continuing unabated, these are difficult times to persuade people to invest in new and untried technology, but many realize that such investment in research and innovation now is crucial to our future prosperity. The next generation of mobile communications is becoming more clearly defined, and the key technologies need to be up to the job. The mantra we are hearing from the ITU’s IMT-2030 Framework: ‘Ubiquity, Intelligence, Sustainability’ captures the challenges aptly. We are pleased that through the initiatives we have taken, more researchers are able to be part of the WWRF family, particularly from developing regions, which will enable their voices to be better heard. I would remind you that any university or research institute in a developing country can now join as a provisional member, not needing to pay membership fees for the first two years.
We have three major events planned for this year, following our 50th meeting in January which was rescheduled from 2023 and held online. Our Huddle this year will be held in Berlin, hosted by Fraunhofer FOKUS and with the support of the German regulator BNetzA. Then we have two regular WWRF meetings, the first hosted by Rowan University in the USA, and the second by Kings College London in the UK.
On the publication front, we are very pleased to announce the first edition of WWRF’s new magazine: Wireless World Research and Trends. This will contain editorial, news and review articles along with peer-reviewed technical papers representing the best inputs to our recent meetings.
Meanwhile our members continue to work with ITU on developing the IMT-2030 concept to look at key technical performance requirements. WWRF continues to work with partner organizations such as One6G, 6GIA and ETSI in Europe and TSDSI and APAN in Asia, and there will be many workshops, joint sessions and projects with these organizations in the coming year.
If you are already a member, please pass on news about WWRF and its activities within your organization, and let people know about what we do, and how they can join in. This can be by making contributions to our meetings, taking direct part in working group activities, proposing new areas of activity and new collaborations, or just passing on news that you think would be important to us. Thank you for all your support in 2023, and I very much hope to see you at a WWRF event or online in the coming year.