FITUR 2018 to anticipate future applications of 5G technology for the tourism industry

13 December 2017

The IFEMA LAB 5G research team is working on the development of 5G prototypes based on four applications: “Augmented Trade Fair”, “Time Travel”, “Translator” and “Teleport”. The prototypes will be presented at the forthcoming staging of the International Tourism Trade Fair organised by IFEMA from 17 to 21 January at Feria de Madrid.

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The work performed by IFEMA LAB 5G, launched by IFEMA and 5TONIC back in September, is achieving advances in the research and development of various 5G prototypes for application to the tourism sector.  The prototypes will provide the initial gateway to an understanding of the potential offered by this innovative technology, which will completely transform the way we experience tourism and tourism management within the context of the trade fair, providing access to practically unlimited communications, data and computation services in real time.

The stage for the presentation will be FITUR 2018, organised by IFEMA from 17 to 21 January at Feria de Madrid, anticipating the launch of 5G from 2021 onwards, with the development of future applications that will be available simultaneously upon the roll-out of these new networks and services.

In this regard, the IFEMA LAB 5G research team has placed its emphasis on two objectives: the application of 5G technologies focused on strengthening and improving current tourist experiences, and the development of new tourist experiences based on 5G network capabilities.

The prototypes to be seen at FITUR 2018 will be based on such applications as “Augmented Trade Fair”; “Time Travel”, which will provide access to all the trade fair sessions in real time and after the event; “Translator”, a multilingual real-time interpreter available to all those attending the trade fair; and “Teleport”, an immersive, three-dimensional teleconferencing service.

A whole process born out of the task of data analysis, natural language processing, 360° video, haptic and multisensory interfaces, augmented reality, localisation, virtual environments and many other operational fields with huge potential application in the tourism sector.

Because according to Arturo Azcorra, Director of IMDEA Networks, Professor of Telematics at Universidad Carlos III, and also Vice-President of 5TONIC, “in the near future we will see how 5G will serve to underpin tourism, with technological advances ranging from very simple applications, such as listening to a tourist guide from mobile to mobile, without passing through the network, or virtual audio guides in the form of an app downloaded to a 5G phone, to highly sophisticated applications involving augmented reality and 5G virtual tourism environments”.