The progress of the 5G standards-setting programme is to be delayed which will affect the pace of the infrastructure roll-out.
The responsible body – 3GPP — says it will  delay work on Stage 3 of Release 16 and that Release 17 would also be delayed.

The responsible body – 3GPP — says it will  delay work on Stage 3 of Release 16 and that Release 17 would also be delayed.

Consequently Stage 3 will not be set as a standard until September 2021.

The two Releases were set to establish the final standards for standalone (SA) 5G networks, industrial IoT devices and vehicle-to-vehicle (V2X) systems, as well as other 5G system architectures.

Release 16 ASN.1 and the Open API specification will  still be set in June.

Release 17 ASN-1 (which refers to abstract syntax notation object identifiers that are maintained by another standards body ETSI), and Open API are scheduled for December 2021.

The delays will affect product development and deployment.

are bound to impact the development of products and thus the deployment of both networks and devices.  For instance, network equipment makers working on 5G SA will now have to delay numerous projects so as to ensure that forthcoming products will comply with the new standards.

The shift of the Rel-16 timeline was approved at the  TSG#87 plenary e-meetings last week.

Rel-16 Stage 3 freeze now June 2020 (shifted by 3 months)
Rel-16 ASN.1 and OpenAPI specification freeze will also be complete in June 2020 (stays as planned)

At the same meeting, a TSG and WG leadership proposal to shift the Rel-17 timeline by 3 months was also agreed:

Rel-17 Stage 3 freeze September 2021
Rel-17 ASN.1 and OpenAPI specification freeze: December 2021

The table below, shows the most recent Releaes only. The data is extracted from the 3GPP portal at https://portal.3gpp.org/, select the “Releases” tab, which shows all of the Release dates (since 1987). Please refer to the Portal page for the most up-to-date information.

Future dates are proposals, subject to change.