National Spectrum Centre Workshop

11 June 2024

The National Spectrum Centre (NSC) held its first industry interaction workshop at AberInnovation in Aberystwyth on Friday 21 June 2024. The workshop was attended by more than 40 participants representing around 30 organisations from across the UK. The aim of the workshop was to share information about the NSC, engage with potential end-users, find out more about their future spectrum requirements and ensure the NSC’s offerings attract as many Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) as possible.

The event opened with a welcome address by Professor Angela Hatton, Pro Vice Chancellor for Research, Knowledge Exchange and Innovation at Aberystwyth University. This was followed by a talk by Professor Amit Kumar Mishra, the new Director of the NSC, who set out his mission and vision along with the centre’s unique value proposition. He explained how the NSC would focus on three main areas to help address the rapidly growing demand for new applications and technologies which use radio spectrum, including areas such as intelligent farming; the Internet of Things; autonomous vehicles; remote health monitoring and beyond 5G.

As well as presentations, break-out sessions were an integral part of the day with smaller groups working through the potential applications and challenges of spectrum technologies in their respective organisations. One common thread was the ability of the NSC to help alleviate the lack of skilled staffing in the radio frequency domain. Another was the provision of a variety of sites for long-term evaluation testing of new spectrum technologies.

The workshop ended with a vote of thanks and a list of future actions. The Spectrum Centre is now planning a follow-up workshop with more technical content from diverse domains to be held in London in early October 2024.