Keysight Technologies has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Indian Institute of Technology, Madras to support Telecom Standards Development Society, India (TSDSI) in development of India specific 5G standards.

The MoU signing follows the International Telecommunication Union (ITU)’s recognition of the 5G Radio Interface Technology (RIT) introduced by TSDSI as a candidate 5G standard, Keysight said.

The Department of Telecommunications (DoT) is funding a large-scale project called 5G Testbed in order to encourage Indian startups and the telecom industry to take an early lead in 5G business. The goal of the project is to build a test bed that closely resembles a real-world 5G deployment.

This project will create a 5G prototype and testing platform that will be developed under the guidance of more than 50 researchers and engineers based in the IIT Madras campus using equipment developed by Keysight Technologies.

Keysight is currently building on the functionality required for testing of new radio interface standards developed at IIT Madras.

“5G promises to open doors to exciting new applications in areas such as telemedicine, remote surgery, agriculture, education, Industry 4.0, smart cities, augmented reality, and autonomous driving,” Satish Dhanasekaran, president, Communications Solutions Group, said.