Virtualization is assumed to be a critical element of 5G, underpinning the flexible core networks which will support dynamic on-demand provisioning of hundreds of different services, and the key justification for 5G, network slicing. So far, virtualized core demonstrations and those of ‘5G’ networks have largely remained separate, but a 5G R&D center in the UK is claiming to be bringing them together for the first time in a public demo. The 5G Innovation Centre (5GIC) at the University of Surrey has followed up its March white paper, which outlined its flat distributed cloud (FDC) architecture, with a demo, conducted with virtual packet core specialist Quortus, Cisco and Huawei. This shows the FDC running a ‘5G’ core, together with a…