Mobile Network Architecture: End-to-End Network Slicing for 5G and Beyond The path from concepts to practice: The 5G PPP Phase 2 project 5G-MoNArch

5th generation mobile networks (5G) aim at ena-bling a large variety of applications, services and use cases for vertical industries and markets. In order to fulfil the verticals’ re-quirements, the 5G network architecture has to be adaptive, flexible and programmable. Network slicing, where multiple vir-tual networks share a common infrastructure spanning over technical domains end-to-end (E2E), is being developed as the cor-responding solution. Considerable effort has already been spent by industry, academia, and standardization bodies at conceptual level. Now, with the 5G networks roll-out getting closer, these con-cepts need to be brought to practice. The 5G-MoNArch project will consolidate the developments and standardization progress in the area of 5G network architecture and network slicing, and will implement and deploy two testbeds along the requirements of two vertical use cases: Extreme mobile broadband in a touristic city, and secure and reliable industrial communication in a sea port en-vironment. With the hands-on experience from these testbeds and the corresponding experimental results, the capabilities of the con-cept of E2E network slicing will be proven.