GSMA Unveils GigaUplink Initiative at MWC26 to Power the Mobile AI Era

During MWC26 Barcelona, the GSMA  unveiled a GigaUplink network initiative towards operators at its Mobile AI Industry Summit. This initiative identifies ubiquitous 20 Mbps uplink with 1 Gbps peak as a key metric. By resolving the uplink bottleneck that limits the scaled adoption of Mobile AI, it enables GigaUplink to play a pivotal role in advancing to mobile AI.

White Paper: GigaUplink Is the Key Technical Direction for Mobile Networks

The GSMA Mobile AI Industry White Paper released alongside the initiative highlights data transmission and network-service synergy as the major challenges of scaling up mobile AI. GigaUplink, deterministic latency, and agentic networks collectively offer a solution to these challenges. Widely hailed as the bedrock for mobile AI, GigaUplink dramatically increases uplink speeds to create opportunities in critical applications like industrial data backhaul, AI device interaction, and immersive entertainment.

Industry Leaders: GigaUplink Will Create Opportunities for Operators

Industry leaders discussed the value of GigaUplink in keynote speeches at the summit. Alex Sinclair, CTO of GSMA, believes the mobile industry is shifting from “connecting people to information” towards “directly connecting intelligence with the physical world”. In his opinion, this trend will require networks to prioritize uplink performance, deterministic latency, and seamless indoor coverage, so as to deepen the AI-physical integration. Huang Yuhong, President of China Mobile Research Institute, talked that the real-time decision-making of terminals like AI assistants, AI glasses, embodied intelligence, and intelligent connected vehicles requires powerful uplink capabilities. Key technologies to enhance uplink performance like 4.9 GHz frame structure adjustment, F/A SUL, and uplink three-carrier aggregation have been commercially verified in multiple scenarios and can be deployed at scale. Dr. Güngör, CTO of Turkcell, voiced confidence that GigaUplink will create new opportunities for operators and promote the shift in telecom networks from coverage-centric to experience-centric, which will help the industry transform from a connectivity enabler into an AI service partner.

Joint Initiative: GigaUplink Networks Will Fuel the Mobile AI Boom

As the summit’s featured event, the GigaUplink network initiative launched by the GSMA aims to establish GigaUplink networks as the foundation of a thriving mobile AI era. This is the joint result of a diverse array of participants from across the industry chain, including Huawei, leading operators, AI ecosystem companies, and industry organizations.

The initiative identifies two major directions: establishing technical standards and capability indicators to promote the adoption and development of GigaUplink, and developing an end-to-end synergy ecosystem covering chips, devices, networks, agents, and applications to eliminate technical barriers.

MWC26 Barcelona takes place from March 2 to March 5 in Barcelona, Spain. During the event, Huawei will showcase its latest products and solutions at stand 1H50 in Fira Gran Via Hall 1.

The era of agentic networks is now approaching fast, and the commercial adoption of 5G-A at scale is gaining speed. Huawei is actively working with carriers and partners around the world to unleash the full potential of 5G-A and pave the way for the evolution to 6G. We are also creating AI-Centric Network solutions to enable intelligent services, networks, and network elements (NEs), speeding up the large-scale deployment of level-4 autonomous networks (AN L4), and using AI to upgrade our core business. Together with other industry players, we will create leading value-driven networks and AI computing backbones for a fully intelligent future.