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Wednesday, 24.04.2024, 15:57
The First-ever 5G Policymakers' Hackathon Announced
The
hackathon will bring together participants from businesses, mobile operators,
European and national policymakers, and lawyers to map existing policy and
develop recommendations for approaches to policy adaptation to support 5G
deployment in the Baltic Sea Region. The event is organised by the Ministry of
Economics of the Republic of Latvia, in cooperation with Electronic
Communications Office of Latvia and with the support of the Nordic Council of
Ministers, and participation of the European Commission to ensure effective
collaboration of required parties to achieve maximum relevance of the
hackathon's output.
The policy
and legal infrastructure improvement recommendations will be presented to the
Nordic Council of Ministers, who are comprised of digital technology ministers
from the Nordic states, and who will be present in Riga for their annual
meeting. The recommendations will also be sent to the European Commission, as
well as presented to 5G stakeholders (Baltic Sea Region country ministers and
company CEOs) participating in the roundtable at the 5G Techritory Forum.
The
reasoning for the hackathon stems from the problem that the legal framework is
not yet in place for the successful implementation of 5G technology, as well as
the solutions it will make possible. The new generation technology is expected
to disrupt society, and the legal framework and infrastructure are required in
order to simultaneously provide the necessary checks and balances, as well as
enable innovation.
Topics
tackled will include cross-border travel issues (ex. autonomous
car/drone/truck/delivery border crossing), infrastructure issues (ex. Ownership
of digital solutions enabling smart cities, GDPR challenges, etc.), development
and safety issues (ex. Traffic accident regulation, insurance liability, data
access, etc.).
While
hackathons are a common occurrence in the tech world, they are rarely applied
to the realm of policy, and for the first time, will be used as a framework for
developing 5G policy.
“5G is one of those technological breakthroughs that has the potential to change the way we live. We have to be responsible for creating an environment and legislation at a cross-border level that will enable new innovations and increase our economic competitiveness globally. That’s why the first-ever 5G policymakers’ hackathon will bring together the key representatives from all Baltic Sea Region countries to create common recommendations for policymakers, to help them to prepare better legislation for the possibilities that 5G technologies will create, and to establish the region as leaders in 5G innovation.”, said Ralfs Nemiro, Minister of Economics of the Republic of Latvia
The
hackathon will ensure the support of various mentors and support personnel,
including Ernests Stals, the co-founder of TechHub Riga to ensure the
innovative nature of the event, mentors from the European Commission to provide
guidance in European policymaking questions, law firms for legal advisory, LMT
(Latvian Mobile Telephone) for technological infrastructure questions, and from
European Ministries of Justice for guidance in GDPR topics.
The
organisers have opened a call for submissions for foreseeable issues and
roadblocks in 5G policy, which the hackathon teams can then select to work on
during the hackathon. Submissions can be submitted by filling out the
feasibility survey here: http://bit.ly/5Gfeasibility
5G
Techritory is the
2nd annual Baltic Sea Region 5G Ecosystem Forum that will bring together up to
1000 senior-level professionals driving the deployment of 5G in Europe, as well
as over 70 industry-leading speakers. The Forum serves as a platform for
cross-border, cross-level, and cross-sectoral collaboration in the Baltic Sea
Region. Registration for the forum is open and can be done at 5Gtechritory.com.