SEOUL, Korea – March 13, 2018 – Samsung Research America, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd., today announced that a key member of its staff has received the 2017 3rd Generation Partnership Project (3GPP) Excellence Award. The award recognizes technical contributions to the continuing innovations in mobile broadband standards and is presented by 3GPP, the global initiative that specifies the details of the latest mobile broadband standards such as LTE and 5G.

This is the fourth time an employee of Samsung received the prestigious award. On this occasion, it was presented to Aris Papasakellariou, a Senior Director of Standards at Samsung Research America, in recognition of his contributions in the field of radio access technology for 5G.

Each year, the award is presented to four individuals who have made outstanding technical contributions to the development of next generation mobile broadband standards in 3GPP. An estimated 1,500 researchers are participating in the 3GPP working group.

“Beyond an individual recognition, this is a validation of the proactive participation taken by Samsung in bringing about future network standards,” said Aris Papasakellariou. “Samsung’s team of engineers will continue its contribution to mobile broadband standardizations and help provide the platform for 3GPP NR (New Radio) and 5G connectivity.”

Samsung has made big strides to making 5G a reality, unveiling the world’s first 5G Fixed Wireless Access (FWA) commercial solutions at MWC 2018 while announcing its collaboration with global network providers. Samsung was selected to supply Verizon with commercial 5G FWA network solutions. The two companies will begin by launching commercial 5G services in Sacramento, California in the second half of 2018. Samsung is collaborating with Charter Communications on 5G trials in the U.S. while Sprint announced that it would deploy Samsung’s 5G solutions to increase Gigabit speeds and capacity.