Wireless connectivity platform vendor Airgain announced on Thursday that it has become a member of the 5G Automotive Association (5GAA). The company joins several telecommunications and automotive companies with the aim of accelerating the penetration of the connected and autonomous car and intelligent fleet management.
Airgain believes it can play an important role in the connected vehicle market by providing antenna technology in support of advanced wireless connectivity solutions for in-vehicle, vehicle-to-vehicle, and vehicle-to-infrastructure applications. It brings to the association a portfolio of connectivity solutions and a wealth of experience in developing antenna applications for government, public safety, and enterprise applications.
Headquartered in San Diego, California, Airgain maintains design and test centers in San Diego, Phoenix, Arizona, Cambridge, United Kingdom, and Suzhou and Shenzhen, China. It delivers advanced antenna technologies used to enable high performance wireless networking across a range of home, enterprise and industrial devices. Its antenna systems open up exciting new possibilities in wireless services requiring high speed throughput, broad coverage footprint, and carrier grade quality; and are found in devices deployed in carrier, enterprise, and residential wireless networks and systems, including set-top boxes, access points, routers, gateways, media adapters, digital televisions, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices.
The 5GAA membership is a pivotal milestone for Airgain. It reiterates the company’s commitment to the research and development of new advanced solutions for the connected car, and contributing to define the new connectivity landscape that will revolutionize the transportation world.
Dino Flore, General Director of the 5GAA: “We are very pleased to welcome Airgain to the 5GAA consortium and look forward to the contributions and expertise that they will bring to defining the standard and applications. Wireless system design will play a key role in the definition and implementation of the new generation of connected cars and infrastructure.”
Alberto Bonamico, Business Development Director, Automotive at Airgain: “We are delighted to join the 5GAA to bring all our efforts on 5G technology to the automotive industry. For the potential of 5G to be realized in the automotive industry, collaboration and development of ecosystems are fundamental. This is how we will achieve real progress with the connected and autonomous car. We are looking forward to working with leaders in the automotive industry, and believe our expertise will help accelerate industry innovation in vehicle connectivity.”
The 5GAA was established in September 2016. The association is developing, testing and promoting communications solutions, supporting standardization and accelerating commercial availability and global market penetration. It is working to address society’s connected mobility and road safety needs with applications such as autonomous driving, ubiquitous access to services and integration into smart city and intelligent transportation.
In May, the 5G Automotive Association announced the election of its new Board members following the General Assembly. Continuing members AUDI AG, BMW Group, China Mobile, Daimler AG, Ericsson, Ford, Huawei, Intel, Nokia, SAIC Motor, Vodafone Group and Qualcomm Incorporated will be joined by AT&T, Jaguar Land Rover, NTT DOCOMO and Samsung Electronics.
The election of AT&T, Jaguar Land Rover, NTT DOCOMO and Samsung Electronics as Board members will strengthen the position of 5GAA as a global, cross-industry association of automotive, technology and telecommunications companies. It reflects the diversity of 5GAA’s membership, both in terms of geographical spread and expertise.
