JOINER’s highlights from the Connected Futures Festival

On 26 March, the University of Bristol, with its partners in JOINER and REASON, hosted the Connected Futures Festival, with satellite events taking place in Belfast, London and Cambridge.

Across the day, Bristol welcomed 100 school children, 300 conference delegates and a total of 1,000 individuals who came together to discuss the latest technology breakthroughs, innovation and collaboration. To celebrate these things, be inspired by these things and most importantly, collectively imagine and experience how our connected world may look in 2035. 

Here are our highlights from the day:

Something exciting is afoot

It’s undeniable that the future of networks and communications is of global strategic importance. It’s also undeniable that a 9m giant robosnail called Luma will pull in the crowds, young and old. Across the day the sheer scale, breadth and depth of the 13 demonstrations presented at Bristol made one thing clear: real breakthroughs are happening and the path to 6G is one of real potential.

Professor Dimitra Simeonidou, Director of Smart Internet Lab, kicked off proceedings by sharing details of a breakthrough that had been achieved just the previous day: a quantum encrypted video communication between Bristol and Cambridge that included many world firsts. It set the tone for the day which presented many demonstrations that had not been seen before, by the public or the telecoms industry. As Ian Bond Pro-Vice Chancellor, Science & Engineering at University of Bristol observed, “we are establishing UK capabilities, literally as we speak.”

A video from Sir Chris Bryant, Minister for Data Protection and Telecoms, observed that the future is inherently hard to predict and shared that this was one of the reasons why the UK government is moving away from talking about “future telecoms” to “advanced connectivity technologies” as a better representation of the situation we face today. Not least “because advanced optics and satellite communications aren’t the ghosts of telecoms futures anymore, but actually telecoms present.”

If the demos in Millennium Square hadn’t yet convinced, a series of rapid fire UK born technologies presentations left conference attendees in no doubt: from enhancing fan experiences with open networks to developing novel and legacy compatible Doppler resilient waveform designs, technology is bounding at pace, across both academia and industry. It brought real evidence to Bryant’s observation that “the breakthroughs we are seeing mean that the UK could once again be a leader in connectivity over the next ten years, and I’m absolutely determined that we take forward those opportunities”.

In an engaging keynote, Nektaria Efthymiou, Network Platform & Security Director at BT Group stated that “we are now in a state where connectivity is the fundamental pillar of growth.”

“Our networks today are good but now is the time to focus on purposeful innovation and drive new services and business models to drive growth from those networks.”

There are significant market opportunities, as long as we design for them…and other lessons from 5G

One of the standout themes from the festival was the concept of purposeful innovation. Ian Bond in his opening comments observed that “we strike a balance between blue sky research and striving to make the world a better place by focusing on real world problems.” It was something we heard many times across the day, from both the supply and demand sides of the ecosystem. 

Sir Chris stated clearly that work on advanced connectivity technologies will be guided by three central ideas. “First of all, do they bring connectivity to everyone, everywhere, whatever your circumstances? Secondly, do they have security and resilience built in from the start? And thirdly, are they built sustainably, so that better connectivity gets us closer to net zero and not further away? These are all equally important, fundamental principles and ideas behind what we’re trying to achieve in this area.”

In the frank spirit of the day, there were several conversations around what needs to be done differently to achieve our collective vision for 2035, and what lessons can be learned from the 5G deployment.

These can be best summarised as:

• Getting better at monetising networks: “we have to fundamentally improve the underlying commercial elements” stated Dan Warren, Director of Communications Research, Samsung Research UK. This was the topic of much discussion and debate with various ideas around how best to achieve this, from more collaborative efforts and joined-up thinking across sectors to two-sided business models at scale, avoiding two-stage deployment cycles, escaping the hype cycle to focus on real, valuable use cases, and extending who we think of as ‘operators’ (neutral hosts and alt nets should be considered a pathway to help us transform networks and business models according to Simon Fletcher, CEO at Real Wireless).
• Simplification: this was something all speakers on the Big 6G questions panel agreed on with a request from Doug Pulley, CTO at RANSemi for “standards to be decisive again”, enabling less scope for interpretation, reduced complexity and cost and a focus on “what we do best”. 
• Embracing AI: “it’s hard to avoid AI in terms of what will really have an impact on networks” stated Bo Olofsson, Software Innovations for Industry Verticals Lead, Nokia Bell Labs. It’s clear there is lots of work to be done here, but there was strong consensus that this is rich ground to exploit. 
• Truly listening to market needs and ensuring solutions meet real-world, known problems: a series of lightning talks on sector specific challenges and opportunities really brought this to the fore. From cities to transport, healthcare and the creative industries to manufacturing it’s clear that the opportunities are significant (“we want everything, everywhere all at once in the citiverse”, Paul Wilson, Chair advisory board and senior advisor for Smart Cities World and Open Agile Smart Cities) but that the stakes are high too. Jessica Pyett-Ellis, Programme Director for 5G Innovation Regions, WM5G, stated that when it comes to healthcare “this is not about the future of networks but the future of people. How do we support independence, deliver better care and improve people’s lives?” There was a sense that 6G, if implemented intentionally, could remove gaps and barriers that have felt impassible for decades when it comes to healthcare, but only if we plan for it and tackle challenges such as privacy and trust, ethical AI frameworks and operational complexities.

It wasn’t just demand-side speakers who were clear on this point. In fact, it was identified as one of the fundamental lessons from 5G. “When it comes to 6G”, said Simon Burley, Technology Director, Networks and Communications Groups, Ofcom., “we need a more pragmatic understanding of the kind of services that are important to people”.

There was a real sense from all parties that we need to move away from the notion of each new generation being an engineering challenge, and instead focus on how we can deliver tangible, improved outcomes to real-world problems.

As Pyett-Ellis observed: “the future isn’t guaranteed even though the tech is coming”.

The power of collaboration

Perhaps what made the festival most special was the fact it brought together so many different groups of people: academia, industry, government and the public. “Academics imagine the future all the time” Simeonidou noted, “but today our challenge is to invite you all to imagine, experience and co-create this future with us.”

Collaboration was a topic that was both discussed at length and demonstrated in spades throughout the day. The importance of bringing together different groups was identified as critical to ensure we can realise the potential of 6G and advanced connectivity technologies, from citizens and communities to corporate venturing and intrapreneurial functions.

Why is collaboration so important? Because, according to Efthymiou, “the opportunities, user cases and benefits are not made possible by networks alone. The future network is not just about connectivity, it’s about creating an ecosystem where innovation can thrive, driving demand and growth in our networks.”

“When you bring together government, industry and academia you can achieve great things” stated Burley. The sentiment was echoed by Julie McCann, Co-Director, School of Convergence Science in Space, Security and Telecoms, Imperial Collage London. “I like to mess things up and be a rebel” she laughed, “but I need people with me to make this work. We need a better mix of humans, including people who haven’t looked at telecoms before.”

Panellists and speakers throughout the day highlighted a number of collaborative initiatives that are already enabling great things, from SONIC Labs to JOINER and Efthymiou left attendees with a clear call to arms: “let’s collaborate to make a dent in the universe.”

You can watch the full recording of the day’s conference here.