Toulouse Métropole looks to boost connectivity with private 5G, IP/MPLS

After becoming a winner of one of the 39 grants awarded under the European Union’s Connecting Europe Facility (CEF) Digital call for projects, and as part of the European HI5 project, the Toulouse Métropole and its partners are to deploy a Nokia shared, multi-service 5G and IP/MPLS private network to enhance the attractiveness of the region by improving municipal and mobility services, while increasing public safety.

Looking at the context of the CEF, the EU noted that making Europe more digital is a key challenge for the current generation. With the increase of online interactions and the emergence of new ways of living, working and doing business showing the central role that digital technologies play, the EU said digital technologies require appropriate digital connectivity infrastructures to function. Yet despite this growing need for connectivity, there still is a “significant gap” in private and public funding.

The CEF Digital comes as a response to this gap. Together with other funding instruments, including the Recovery and Resilience Facility and the InvestEU, CEF Digital will help to support an unprecedented amount of investments devoted to safe, secure and sustainable high-performance infrastructure – in particular, Gigabit and 5G networks across the EU.

This action will be important in supporting Europe’s digital transformation, as outlined in the Path to the Digital Decade proposal. The CEF Digital is also designed will contribute to the increased capacity and resilience of digital backbone infrastructures in all EU territories, and is seen as crucial for Europe’s ambition to continue being digitally sovereign and independent in the years to come.

One such region is Toulouse Métropole, the fifth largest area of its kind in France, covering an area of 458.2 km² with a population of nearly 8000,0000 people. The main objective of theCEF Digital project for Toulouse Métropole is to improve municipal services for citizens, establish a safer and more environmentally friendly city, develop innovation zones and improve mobility services in the territory.

The new IT infrastructure will initially cover a test area of 16 km² which will be used to test various use cases before being extended to the entire metropolitan area.

As part of its contract, Nokia will deploy an industrial-grade 5G private and IP/MPLS network. It will also contribute to the competitiveness of its local enterprises through the development of innovation zones by offering very high-speed mobile access services.

This infrastructure will be used to validate with numerous users the relevance of these new services in the following areas: culture/events, transport/new mobility, education, public infrastructure connectivity and security.

Use cases to be implemented include: connectivity and group communication for public events; training of students in 5G applications; extending broadband connectivity to rural/underserved areas with poor fibre coverage; real-time analysis of video streams to improve community security; and fast video loading on the move such as in the metro.

"Toulouse Métropole, winner of the European HI5 call for projects, will now launch, with its partners, a digital development of the metropolitan area that will protect local businesses from the explosion in operating costs associated with these new needs,” said Bertrand Serp, vice-chairman of Toulouse Mét Métropole.

“It is based on granular infrastructures of fibre, routers and technical rooms to create a complete digital infrastructure. This will enable the development of  sovereign and independent 5G communications to offer new use cases and develop the connected and sustainable metropolis of tomorrow.”

“We are proud to support the Toulouse Metropole in its digital transformation. It is the first metropolis in France to acquire an infrastructure that brings the best of 5G and IP/MPLS technologies to its citizens,” added Matthieu Bourguignon, vice-president enterprise Europe at Nokia.

“This is a testament to the dynamism of this region and its commitment to develop as a centre for innovation and economic advancement and improve the quality of life throughout the community.

“Nokia brings to the Toulouse Metropole our expertise in deploying high performance IP/MPLS and 4G/5G networks for more than 1,000 public sector agencies throughout the globe, with almost 600 customers for our private wireless network opportunities.”