Establishing a 5G autonomous driving base, an experimental city to verify technology

SK Telecom and the Korea Transportation Safety Authority announced that they have built 5G infrastructure in the main test sections of the autonomous driving experimental city 'K-City'. This is the first time in the world that 5G infrastructure has been built in an autonomous driving experimental city.

SK Telecom and the Korea Transportation Safety Authority worked closely together to establish 5G infrastructure in K-City, including a 20Gbps 5G test network capable of transmitting a 1GB movie in just 0.4 seconds, a 5G communication control center that exchanges data with test vehicles in just 0.001 seconds, and a 3D HD map with a precision of less than 20cm. These results were achieved in just three months since groundbreaking.

K-City 5G infrastructure is a system that applies the latest 5G technologies such as beamforming, beam tracking, and network virtualization to all sections including wireless and switchboard.

SK Telecom and the Korea Transportation Safety Authority have established a '5G autonomous driving outpost' in Korea to verify convergence technologies by building a 5G infrastructure in K-City. While there are no experimental cities overseas where 5G autonomous driving technologies can be verified, Korean companies can verify related technologies at K-City on a regular basis and speed up their development.

SK Telecom and the Korea Transportation Safety Authority plan to open 5G infrastructure to domestic companies and organizations and support the development of autonomous driving technology. In the midst of fierce global competition in autonomous driving technology, an opportunity has opened for Korea to lead the competition based on its strength in ‘5G+autonomous driving.’

5G is a key infrastructure for implementing V2X (Vehicle to Everything) technology, such as vehicle-to-vehicle communication, vehicle-to-IoT/control center communication, etc. Autonomous vehicles can exchange comprehensive surrounding environment data, such as vehicle driving information in blind spots, through 5G infrastructure to predict accident risks in advance.


For example, if a child suddenly runs into the road, a camera/sensor mounted on a streetlight detects the danger and transmits it to the control center and surrounding autonomous vehicles via 5G within 0.1 second. The 5G infrastructure also transmits intersection signals, construction ahead, and accident situations. K-City has the infrastructure to experiment with the latest 5G autonomous driving technology in various other scenarios.

“K-City has an environment that is more advanced than other countries’ autonomous driving test cities, including 5G infrastructure, cutting-edge testing facilities, and various driving tracks,” said Kwon Byung-yoon, CEO of the Korea Transportation Safety Authority. “We will spare no support so that various domestic companies and organizations can lead the global autonomous driving technology competition.”

SK Telecom ICT Technology Center Director Park Jin-hyo said, “We will always expand the 5G K-City infrastructure with the latest technology so that K-City can become the center of the 5G autonomous driving ecosystem.”

Meanwhile, K-City is an autonomous driving experimental city with a total area of 363,000㎡ (approximately 110,000 pyeong) being developed by the Korea Transportation Safety Authority under the Ministry of Land, Infrastructure and Transport in Hwaseong-si, Gyeonggi-do. It consists of various experimental spaces that reflect actual road environments, such as △downtown △automobile-only zone △suburban zone.