I first wrote about the five Qualcomm wireless inventions that defined the 5G NR Release 15 foundation in 2016, and it was a time when 5G was only a vision. With the completion of Release 16 in 2020, I published another blog post that outlined the importance of Release 16 and the key Qualcomm technology inventions that can enable the expansion of 5G to new devices, spectrum, and industries.
Just last week, 3GPP declared the official completion of 5G NR Release 17 (stage 3 functional freeze, with ASN.1 targeted for June). So, to continue with the tradition, let me provide a closer look at the technology inventions in Release 17. I have distilled them into five key areas where Qualcomm played a key role driving technology into the standards.
