The next wave of 5G technology is emerging, and operators are rapidly exploring its new capabilities and monetization opportunities. 5G-Advanced (5G-A) technology goes beyond improved connectivity to turn 5G networks into a springboard for smarter, revenue-driving services that meet changing customer expectations.

What makes 5G-A so promising? Operators are excited because it enables them to reimagine the value of next-generation networks, with a focus on advanced, enterprise-grade features and game-changing performance. With 5G-A, operators can tailor services and use cases to meet particular requirements for position, control, and guaranteed outcomes.

For enterprise customers across various industries, 5G-A can redefine industrial IoT operations, time-sensitive communications, and private network deployments. New services, such as improved edge integration, more granular network slicing, and device energy efficiency, are ideal for smart factories, automated transportation, and other applications.

Consumers also benefit, with more immersive experiences delivered by XR-enabled networks, expanded service coverage through satellite support, and dynamic QoS management for more differentiated service offerings.

The 5g core is fundamental to service innovation

At the heart of these new monetization opportunities is the 5G Core. In 3GPP Release 18, the core is transformed into a revenue engine, acting as the primary control point for intelligent service delivery. Enabling real-time analytics, edge offload, more programmable control, and exposure functions, it empowers developers, partners, and enterprises to build value on top of the network. Examples of these new capabilities include:

• **Robust slicing and policy control: **Flexibility is fundamental for evolving enterprise and consumer use cases, and 5G-A offers enhanced network slicing to meet new demands. Release 18 lets operators support slice replacement, partial slices, and slice capacity enforcement. The 5G Core plays a crucial role, offering enhanced policy control and session management capabilities for end-to-end resource orchestration and more robust policy enforcement.
• Multi‑**access and edge integration: **Multi-access capabilities are increasingly important for edge use cases and other connectivity requirements. With 5G-A, organizations can utilize local breakout for edge computing, non-3GPP access, such as Wi-Fi, and Access Traffic Steering, Switching, and Splitting (ATSSS), which converges mobile and Wi-Fi services. To facilitate integration, the 5G Core can make path selection decisions and apply analytics for optimal reliability and performance.
• **Vertical use case innovation:**With 5G-A, operators can support increasingly sophisticated use cases like satellite integration, augmented and virtual reality (AR/VR), unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and complex IoT deployments. These services all have particular security, QoS, and subscription profile requirements. The 5G Core performs critical functions like profile management. It handles new interactions for capabilities such as control plane and user plane event exposure. It also helps assure stable sessions spanning all edge and RAN topologies.
• **Exposure and monetization capabilities:**Release 18 expands several 5G Core exposure features to enable operators to monetize real-time policy and advanced analytics. Leveraging the 5G Core, operators can orchestrate slicing, local breakouts, and dynamic QoS. Together, these capabilities set the stage for great user experiences and compelling recurring revenue streams.

Continuous testing and assurance are essential to success

Like any transformative technology, 5G-A offers new features and updates that must be thoroughly tested before being rolled out to operational networks. Operators will want to perform traditional functionality and interoperability tests, as well as assess security and performance.

Since modern mobile infrastructures are continually evolving and changing, 5G-A testing should be continuous, extending from planning to the production network and beyond, to ensure optimal service quality.

With comprehensive testing spanning the entire lab-to-live lifecycle, operators can reduce risks and costs, accelerate time to market, and provide a superior experience to end customers. Key methodologies include:

Digital twins and emulators

Engineers often utilize network and traffic emulators to test new mobile features in an isolated sandbox environment before making them available to subscribers. These emulators essentially set up "digital twins" of the 5G network for easy experimentation and manipulation, without requiring expensive test labs and equipment. An emulator can perform diverse tasks, such as modeling intermittent non-terrestrial network (NTN) satellite coverage or creating millions of virtual eRedCap sensors, with stress-testing capabilities to validate resilience.

Digital twins emulate 5G Core functions, enabling operators to simulate real-world challenges to validate vendor performance, interoperability, security, compliance, lifecycle management, and more.

Hybrid emulation and ota testing

Some operators looking to combine the best of virtual and physical lab testing are combining digital twin emulation with over-the-air (OTA) testing using actual handsets. This repeatable hybrid approach is effective for user experience validation. It lets operators mirror and evaluate actual subscriber behavior from the device to the RAN and core.

Hybrid emulation is especially effective for complex scenarios, such as roaming, mobility, dual-SIM use, and concurrent application usage. It can also reveal performance issues that are difficult to detect in other testing environments.

Continuous testing within a ci/cd pipeline

Today’s 5G networks are dynamic, continually evolving environments. With functions delivered by cloud-native micro-services and vendors deploying updates, a continuous testing approach is essential. This testing should be tightly integrated into a CI/CD pipeline, where every change is subject to an automated "validation exam." Testing should encompass performance, security, resilience, interoperability, and other key criteria.

Continuous testing can also support lifecycle management. The pipeline automatically reruns regression tests against the live instance and performs an automated rollback if a failure occurs. This closed-loop approach enables operators to innovate, release, and monetize 5G-A services with complete confidence.

Active testing for service assurance

Active testing in the live operational network is key for service assurance. This methodology introduces synthetic traffic from the device edge through the RAN, transport networks, 5G Core, and actual application servers.

Many 5G-A features will only demonstrate their actual behavior when the network is subjected to end-to-end testing under realistic traffic conditions. Active testing helps operators expose hidden policy conflicts, anomalies, or other issues before paying customers are impacted by service degradations. Active test agents can also provide key performance indicators (KPIs) that form the basis for objective proof of performance and a trustworthy set of service level agreements (SLAs). These metrics provide a foundation for turning innovation into monetizable services.

Moving forward into 5g-a with confidence

As the pace of change accelerates and competitive pressure intensifies, it’s more crucial than ever for operators to ensure that their investments deliver the expected outcomes and revenue opportunities. By proactively embedding continuous testing and advanced methodologies into their planning, deployment, and operations, mobile operators can take a big step forward in meeting today’s 5G demands—and tomorrow’s.