Turin is set to become the first city in Italy with a commercial 5G mobile network after the municipality signed a memorandum of understanding with Telecom Italia (TIM). The agreement launches a metropolitan trial planned to begin in 2018, with the goal of extending coverage across the entire city by 2020.
TIM will install more than 100 small cells in key urban areas and deploy connections at both of the city’s universities. The initial trial will include around 3,000 users, who will test the network’s performance and applications in real-world conditions.
While industry conversations about 5G have often been accompanied by hype—as evidenced by its prominence at trade events—concrete plans for a network of 5G-enabled European cities are taking shape. Cities across Europe are preparing their own trials: Bristol recently entered the race to become the first UK city to test 5G, and Amsterdam, one of the host cities for the 2020 European Football Championship, plans to use 5G to enable high-quality live video streaming during the tournament.
The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) released a draft specification outlining the expected 5G performance targets. The proposed minimum requirements include a peak downlink rate of 20 Gbit/s and a peak uplink rate of 10 Gbit/s. Industry observers described these targets as ambitious but potentially achievable, reflecting the significant step-change in capacity 5G aims to deliver compared to current mobile generations.
TIM characterized the agreement as reinforcing its commitment to mobile innovation and its role in contributing to the definition of 5G standards. Giuseppe Recchi, TIM’s executive chairman, emphasized the link between network quality and broader digital transformation: “When we talk about big data, digital identity and the Internet of Things, we are aware that underlying all this there is always quality and the speed of the networks. TIM has the privilege of being a leading company in the development of the digital culture of the country and today this agreement adds another important element to our strategy.”
Chiara Appendino, mayor of Turin, welcomed TIM’s choice of the city for the trial: “It is a positive sign that TIM has chosen Turin as an urban area to test an innovative technology such as 5G, linked to the mobile network. The high-speed services and applications can only bring benefit, in the immediate future, to the manufacturing world and the community.”
Beyond improved mobile broadband, the trial will consider smart city applications including public transport fleet management, remote surveillance, virtual reality for tourism, and Industry 4.0 use cases aimed at modernizing manufacturing and industrial processes. These applications rely not only on raw speed but on lower latency, higher connection density, and greater reliability—capabilities 5G promises to deliver.
Roberto Minerva, chair of the Internet of Things initiative at IEEE, notes that each city approaches “smart” development differently. He pointed to Venice as an example of a city that faced unique challenges launching smart city initiatives. According to Minerva, successful deployments depend on combining appropriate technology with an understanding of the local cultural and social context so the network can collect and make meaningful use of data specific to that environment.
Industry forecasts predict rapid growth in 5G adoption. The GSMA expects commercial 5G networks to be widely deployed by the early 2020s, with global connections reaching around 1.1 billion by 2025. If Turin’s trial and similar city-level projects succeed, they will help shape the technical standards, business models, and public policies that guide broader 5G rollout across Europe and beyond.