Experience Building a 5G Testbed Platform

The 5G-VINNI testbed infrastructure project provides 5G facilities for pan-European services. Within the project, the UK site is one of the 5G-VINNI facilities that targets developing a flexible and dynamic test environment which can be adapted to meet requirements from H2020 funded projects as well as external trials, to enable vertical industries to assess 5G networks in the context of advanced digital use cases. In this paper, we present a full overview of the 5G test infrastructure developed at the UK 5G-VINNI facility, including backhaul, edge, slicing, interworking and validation. This work presents an operator’s experience in setting up a testbed facility and in engaging with different verticals conducting their research projects using the 5G facility, and the results and benefits to the industry. Furthermore, the lessons learned from the design, installation, operation and experimentation phases of the project are discussed.