Jyh-Cheng Chen, chair professor at the Department of Computer Science and dean of the College of Computer Science at National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University (NYCU), has led an academic team in developing "free5GC," an open-source 5G core network compliant with the 3GPP R15 standard.
The team subsequently extended it into the 6G domain, producing the world's first open-source 6G core network. This breakthrough is anticipated to bolster Taiwan's influence in shaping the future of 6G technology in both academia and industry.
According to data provided by NYCU, Chen has cultivated close collaborations with industry partners. In previous research, he worked with Delta Electronics to develop the optical intelligence-defined tunnel network system (OPTUNS), comprising 400 industrial-grade servers and optical-electrical network systems.
The collaboration is ongoing, with current research and development focused on addressing the demands of 6G, particularly software and hardware systems for edge data center networks.
Additionally, Compal Electronics has supplied Chen with white-box base stations supporting Open Radio Access Network (O-RAN) functionality, enabling the development and testing of physical data interfaces. Chunghwa Telecom has provided an experimental telecom network to validate and test critical applications.
The Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI) has contributed an edge computing platform built on the O-RAN architecture, featuring a Service Management and Orchestration (SMO) system, along with non-real-time (Non-RT) and near-real-time (Near-RT) RAN Intelligent Controllers (RIC). This platform allows academic institutions to create development environments for key 6G applications and transfer the resulting technologies to industry.
Many of Chen's projects receive funding from institutions such as the National Science and Technology Council and the Ministry of Economic Affairs. Chen has assembled a team of professors and graduate students to work on several sub-projects, including a collaboration with Delta Electronics to develop key AI models for 6G QoE applications, integrated via APIs. This integration strengthens the synergy between AI and high-performance 6G edge data centers, enabling low-latency and efficient AI as a Service (AIaaS).
Another notable research achievement is the integration of decentralized technologies with federated learning (FL) and a federated learning platform-as-a-service (FL PaaS). To date, only a few FL frameworks, such as Flower, FedML, FATE, Pysyft, and TensorFlow Federated, have been introduced globally.
However, these frameworks are primarily focused on specific use cases or academic research, built on cloud platforms, and lack the ability to incorporate mobile smart devices or hierarchical learning architectures with edge computing—rendering them unsuitable for future 6G applications.
To address these limitations, the academic team has proposed an open-source "Federated Learning Platform-as-a-Service Framework" (EdgeFL) for 6G intelligent networks. This framework addresses the heterogeneity of both mobile and fixed User Equipment (UEs), leveraging distributed 6G multi-access edge computing (MEC) resource nodes for hierarchical model training, effectively adapting to the future 6G environment.
The objective of 6G networks is to provide energy-efficient, high-speed, and low-latency mobile network services through the deployment of denser small base stations, expanded access bandwidth, and edge computing technology.
Some institutions predict that by 2026, the number of connected devices globally will reach 26.4 billion. Integrating 6G with the Internet of Things (IoT), augmented reality (AR), virtual reality (VR), and mixed reality (MR) technologies is expected to make the metaverse experience a reality.
As Taiwan's academic and industrial sectors advance from 5G to 6G, they are focusing not only on terminal devices but also on expanding indigenous technologies from the core network to the entire communications infrastructure.
