New one6G white paper on 6G & Robotics

one6G Association Working Group 1 released a new white paper, titled “6G & Robotics.” The paper analyzes a set of use cases and potential service requirements in different domains, such as education, logistics, and healthcare.

The scope

one6G recognizes a growing demand for robotic applications, which are envisioned to penetrate several application areas and societal sectors. Alongside this growth, there are several ongoing developments in the mobile communications industry toward enabling diverse services in vertical industries. Discussions related to integrating mobile communication capability into robotics systems are gaining significant momentum. It is foreseen that this integration can give rise to new possibilities to address relevant industrial and societal challenges.

one6G believes that to successfully support the foreseen rise in robotics applications in different scenarios, communication systems must be capable of supporting higher density of communication links (including inter-robot and intra-robot communication) with stringent performance requirements. They must also ensure service availability at almost all times and everywhere, provide highly accurate environment awareness, e.g., positioning, support highly dynamic QoS adaptation mechanism for safety when in close proximity with humans, and enhance sensing capability for robot operation efficiency and functional safety, among others. Apart from enhancing communication system performance, developing robotics systems with a much higher-degree of programmability by exploiting capabilities, such as cloud and AI (e.g., distributed ML) technologies is required to help develop cost-effective and flexible robot operation in diverse scenarios. Large deviations in AI regulations between Europe, China, and the USA can already be seen and they must be reflected in robotics system development.

This white paper identifies robotics use cases and recognizes the potential role of mobile communication systems, particularly 6G systems. To understand the involvement of mobile communication systems, the robotic system requirements for each use case have been identified. For each of the robotic system requirements, the potential contribution of the communication system has been determined. Based on this analysis, additional capabilities that 6G systems might need to fulfil for efficiently supporting robotic use cases have been outlined.

You can download the one6G white Paper on 6G & Robotics here (PDF)