6G-Research and Innovation Cluster (6G-RIC)
Open and secure 6G-technologies: Global market opportunity for Germany
The "6G Research and Innovation Cluster" (6G-RIC) pursues the goal of developing mobile radio systems with open interfaces across all technological boundaries. The focus is on technology development and the construction of a powerful test infrastructure. The test infrastructure will enable the testing of new technology components under realistic and open conditions. This will accelerate direct recycling and ensure the development of a new ecosystem in the medium term.
The 6G-Research and Innovation Cluster aims to develop the essential key technologies of future 6G- communication systems. These key technologies should be tested at an early stage in the form of so-called technology demonstrators. The new technologies from the areas of sub-THz communication, co-design of software and hardware along with virtualized and programmatically controllable campus networks will enable new applications in a 6G-infrastructure. At the same time, they will rapidly advance the development of a 6G-infrastructure. As part of the 6G-RIC, the newly developed technology components from the laboratory and test environment will be brought together in overarching end-to-end demonstrators and presented in the context of selected 6G use cases.
48 months
Project duration
(08/2021 - 07/2025)
70 million euros
Financial support
(50 million approved)
20
Project Partners
(Universities and research institutes)


The figure illustrates the expansion of the design dimensions during the transition from 5G to 6G: When designing 5G, the focus was on using the scarce frequency resource as efficiently as possible by using spatial signal processing. With the availability of large bandwidths at higher frequencies into the sub-THz range, the spectrum scarcity will be alleviated, while the importance of optimal utilization of the energy resource will continue to increase. The additional 6G-resources "Computing" and "Data" will be tapped by the (artificial) intelligence (AI) integrated into the network. In addition to this "network intelligence", "security by design" is a central element of the 6G-system concept in 6G-RIC.
Technological Innovation Areas
Project Partners













