Hi-tech distance learning thanks to mini 4G and 5G networks: this is what happens in some schools in the United States, where to make distance lessons more efficient, small private networks have been built to which students can connect thanks to the Sim they have had from their institution.
It is one of the possible applications of small mobile networks that are gaining increasing attention during the Covid-19 pandemic.
"We are beginning to see that our technology is being adopted for uses that we did not suspect", observes Gianluca Verin, who in 2005 decided to return to Italy after ten years of work abroad to found the Athonet startup with his colleague Karim El Malki, Italian of an Eiziano father.
"We had decided it made sense to return to Italy, even though we knew it would not be easy to find funding," notes Verin. The real baptism of fire took place in 2012, with the earthquake in Emilia Romagna, when the startup created the first cellular network in the world dedicated to emergencies. "Even today, 5G networks for emergencies are built with the same philosophy", but since then the technology developed in Italy has grown and is called Private Cellular Network 5G and 4G. The Vicenza-based company has meanwhile collected several international awards and aims to reach 110 employees by 2021. "In this pandemic year we have intensified our investments in Research and Development, expanded collaborations all over the world and continued to hire" , explains Verin. Ports, airports and critical infrastructures are, alongside businesses, the new users of tailor-made 5G networks. (HANDLE).