Streetlights and 5G smart cells are made for each other, according to Germany’s O2 Telefonica, which started piloting the concept in Frankfurt during 2021 where it is now expanding city-wide. Other operators around the world are also picking up this idea of combining 5G small cells with street lighting to achieve the required densification at the same time as serving new “smart city” IoT applications from these converted poles. This can be regarded as the second generation of smart street lighting, succeeding early incarnations where connectivity was provided by LPWAN networks, often based on the LoRa protocol. Indeed, Rethink Research described Philips Lighting’s choice of Vodafone for its CityTouch connected street lighting platform as early as March 2016, as part…