Nokia and Bosch set a new bar for 5G positioning and look ahead to 6G #MWC23

Nokia and Bosch have developed 5G-based precision positioning technology for Industry 4.0. The technology has been tested in a Bosch production plant in Germany, with accuracy within 50 cm in 90% of the factory’s footprint. Nokia and Bosch are continuing their research to explore the integration of sensing technologies in future 6G systems.

The 5G-based positioning technology tracks the positions of mobile and portable devices, accurately determining their locations where there is no global navigation satellite service coverage. It is especially important in industrial environments for applications such as robot navigation, asset tracking, and worker safety. An enhanced private 5G network was used in the factory test to determine the precise position of assets such as automated guided vehicles, mobile robots, and mobile control panels.

Nokia and Bosch’s technology works by equipping 5G nodes with multiple receive antennas, allowing the network to detect incoming angles of signals. The time-delay and angle-of-arrival information are interpreted using advanced Nokia Bell Labs algorithms to determine the most probable position of the mobile device. The accuracy level achieved by the proof-of-concept is beyond the current cellular position state-of-the-art and provides a glimpse of what 5G networks will be capable of in the future.

In addition to the operational benefits, realizing both high-performance connectivity and high-accuracy positioning within a single private network’s infrastructure has many other advantages. The collaboration between Nokia and Bosch on the precision positioning technology is a significant milestone, with Nokia and Bosch already conducting joint research on future 6G networks.

The next generation of networking, 6G networks, will be commercially available by the end of the decade. 6G will have the ability to track the position of any object, whether connected or unconnected, and will function similarly to radar, giving users an awareness of their surroundings beyond their traditional senses. Nokia and Bosch are exploring how future 6G networks could be used for both communications and sensing.

Peter Vetter, President of Bell Labs Core Research at Nokia, said that they are creating networks that will endow humans with a digital 6th sense. The Nokia and Bosch joint research underpins Bosch’s leading role in exploring new opportunities for their customers and developing the Factory of the Future. Meet Nokia and Bosch at the Mobile World Congress 2023 #MWC23.