Sophia Antipolis, 14 February 2023 – In the last three months, ETSI ISG MEC has released its final Phase 2 specification (GS MEC 015, on Traffic Management APIs) and made significant progress on Phase 3 with the release of a number of important specifications, including the MEC Federation Enablement APIs (GS MEC 040): in particular, this specification is critical for supporting the requirements received from GSMA OPG (Operator Platform Group) to enable inter-MEC system communication and allow 5G operators to collaborate among themselves, with service cloud providers and with other stakeholders.
New APIs are introduced for the enablement of the MEC federation, helping operators to “federate” edge computing resources by offering their MEC service capabilities for mutual consumption, application developers, and end customers (e.g., vertical market segments).
Other great Phase 3 achievements include the publication of an updated set of MEC services APIs (GS MEC 013 on Location API and the new GS MEC 033 on IoT API); a study on MEC in Park Enterprises deployment scenario (MEC 038); and Guidelines on Interoperability testing (MEC-DEC 042).
“Clearly, the industry is now considering MEC technologies with increasing interest” notes Dario Sabella, chair of the ETSI ISG MEC. “We can see it through the continuously growing ETSI ISG MEC membership and also thanks to the remarkable progress of the group on the consolidation of important activities for MEC Phase 3. The normative work in MEC (Multi-access Edge Computing) is maintaining its usual approach and commitment to deliver open standards in alignment with other SDOs, avoid duplication of work and promote collaboration with relevant stakeholders, including industrial associations and open-source projects”.
MEC open area
Additionally, the group is continuing to enhance its MEC Open Area (available here) by adding stable drafts, and selected early drafts such as the GS MEC 011 and GS MEC 040 specifications, which are essential for the Phase 3 work, especially in the view of MEC Federation (and for the collaboration with other bodies like GSMA and 3GPP). This publicly accessible folder provides visibility to all stakeholders about ongoing ISG MEC progress on key deliverables.
MEC Hackathon, OpenAPI and MEC sandbox
“With Phase 3 in full swing, the working group DECODE is deeply committed to supporting the ISG and showcasing its work with existing and exciting new initiatives,” observes Walter Featherstone, chair of WG DECODE. “The MEC Sandbox development and utilisation continue to expand, demonstrated through the recent ETSI/LF Edge Hackathon that benefited from recent V2X information service- focused capability enhancement. Developing the group’s testing support capabilities will also be a key theme in 2023”.
As a further demonstration of the collaborations ETSI ISG MEC continues to nurture, 2022 saw ETSI partner with Linux Foundation (LF Edge Akraino) to deliver their first joint hackathon. At this event, MEC application developers were asked to provide solutions built from the MEC APIs and the Akraino Blueprints. Selected finalists presented their solutions with a face-to-face “pitch-off” to decide the overall winner at Edge Computing World (the final event day in October).
OpenAPI-compliant descriptions are available for all Phase 2 APIs at ETSI Forge and through the MEC Sandbox, both of which continue to be enhanced through the Phase 3 activities. The MEC Sandbox offers an interactive environment that enables edge application developers to learn and experiment with MEC service APIs from anywhere in the world. With an emulated edge network set in Monaco, the Sandbox implements key MEC services and capabilities, including support for MEC platforms that are geographically distributed within the MEC Sandbox’s edge network.
Moving forward, ISG MEC will continue to foster its collaborations with other SDOs (e.g., 3GPP, ITU), industry groups (e.g., GSMA, 5GAA) and open-source projects (e.g., LF, Eclipse).
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