The French government unveiled a series of measures aimed at accelerating the deployment of industrial 5G use cases, which it stated is lagging because of several key obstacles including access to relevant spectrum frequencies.

Following the publication of a report and related recommendations by Philippe Herbert, president of the Mission 5G Industrielle, the government vowed to enable access to 2.6GHz frequencies to stimulate industrial 5G projects, along with exploring potential access to the 3.8GHz and 4GHz bands.

Others measures include the launch by France and Germany of a joint call for 5G private network projects, where industrial players which have identified use cases are invited to express their interest before 8 April.

A “matchmaking” event designed to bring together users and solution providers will then be arranged for later in April.

Furthermore, France will soon call for expressions of interest in specialist 5G industry zones called Campus Fablab 5G industrielle, which aim to bring together all the relevant players for industrial projects including operators, equipment manufacturers, integrators, suppliers and more.

The Mission 5G Industrielle report identified a total of seven reasons why industrial use is dragging its heels in France compared with other European countries, including the insufficient availability of suitable equipment and services, difficulty in finding the right skills, and the lack of maturity of French and European industrial 5G ecosystems.

Meanwhile, the government is also providing €47 million in funding for seven new research and development projects under the national 5G acceleration plan which was launched in July 2021. It noted the programme has already supported a total of 31 projects to date, to the tune of €478 million.

A key aim of the programme, which falls within the wider France 2030 investment plan, is to strengthen the nation’s competitive position in the development and production of future network technologies.

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