The 6G-REFERENCE consortium is proud to announce that its pioneering work on Time-Modulated Array (TMA) technology, led by the Electronics Lab at ETH Zürich, one of our partners, has been selected among the Top-10 Key Achievements of the Smart Networks and Services Joint Undertaking (SNS JU) for 2025 in the Category 1: ‘Significant Technology Development’.
The recognition highlights the project’s impactful contribution to next-generation wireless systems and its strong technological and scientific momentum within Europe’s 6G roadmap, as it has been awarded among 188 submissions across 63 SNS projects.
This distinction was officially unveiled by SNS JU in its 2025 Top-10 Key Achievements announcement, that was further showcased in the webinar “From Research to Impact: Exploring the Top-10 Key Achievements of SNS JU Projects” on 3 December 2025, where Professor Hua Wang of ETH Zürich presented the team’s work.
A New Hardware Paradigm for 6G: Time-Modulated MIMO Arrays
A central ambition of the 6G-REFERENCE project is to unlock coherent wireless communication and sensing capabilities that go well beyond what 5G systems can achieve. This is especially critical for emerging 6G architectures such as cell-free distributed MIMO networks, which demand low-latency, simultaneous communication and sensing with large numbers of users.
However, scaling current hardware to support many concurrent users remains a major technological bottleneck, since traditional multi-beam MIMO arrays require complex, power-hungry, and expensive architectures.
To overcome these limitations, the ETH Zürich team introduced a new hardware concept: the Time-Modulated MIMO Array (TMA). By dynamically modulating the ON/OFF states of each antenna element, a single array can generate multiple orthogonal, time-varying radiation patterns.
This breakthrough enables simultaneous yet interference-free communication and sensing with multiple users; significant reduction in chip area, hardware complexity, and power consumption, and a scalable solution compatible with future 6G network demands.
The ETH team successfully implemented and demonstrated this technology in two fully functional 6G hardware prototypes, validated through lab measurements, an essential step toward practical deployment.
The ETH Zürich Team behind the 6G-REFERENCE Achievement: Hua Wang and Basem Abdelaziz
Hua Wang, Full Professor of Electronics and Principal Investigator at ETH Zürich, highlighted the technological leap enabled by the new approach:
“Concurrent multi-beam MIMO arrays are a promising candidate to enhance next-generation wireless communication and sensing capabilities. However, most existing multi-beam MIMO array architectures require complex and expensive hardware. The time modulated array, which our ETH Zürich team is exploring, provides a completely different and non-conventional approach. It enables concurrent multi-beam MIMOs with much lower hardware overhead, achieving more functionalities with less complexity. The 6G-REFERENCE project is a wonderful research and education opportunity at the cross-road of electronics, electromagnetics, signal processing, and machine learning. We are also grateful to the visionary project leadership from SNS JU, CTTC, and the University of Twente.”
Basem Abdelaziz, PhD researcher at ETH Zürich and lead contributor to the TMA prototypes, expressed his enthusiasm for the recognition:
“I am truly honored for this wonderful recognition from the SNS JU committee. I have always been eager to explore new research directions in my PhD rather than incremental works, so I am really excited now to witness the fruit of that. I feel grateful to my PhD supervisor, Prof. Hua Wang, for his vision and unwavering support and for giving me freedom in my research. I would also like to thank our amazing partners in the 6G-REFERENCE consortium for the fruitful technical collaborations.”
Showcasing Impact at the SNS JU 2025 Top-10 Achievements Webinar
The 6G-REFERENCE achievement was presented by Hua Wang during the webinar “From Research to Impact: Exploring the Top-10 Key Achievements of SNS JU Projects” on 3 December 2025.
The other awarded projects were SEASON, SUPERIOT, 6G-SANDBOX, 6G-XR, SUNRISE-6G, Imagine-B5G, TrialsNet, 6G-SHINE, and HEXA-X-II.
In addition to the 10 SNS JU projects, the session included keynotes and opening remarks by several leaders from the European Commission, SNS JU, and its Technology Board, including:
- Thibaut Kleiner, Director for Future Networks, DG CONNECT.
- Erzsébet Fitori, Executive Director, SNS JU.
- Pavlos Fournogerakis, Deputy Head of Programmes, SNS JU.
- Kostas Trichias, Chairman, SNS JU Technology Board.
Prof. Hua Wang’s presentation “Time-Modulated Arrays Supporting Both Receive and Transmit” highlighted how concurrent multi-beam MIMO systems will enable entirely new joint communication and sensing applications.
When asked about the next steps to bring the technology closer to market readiness, Prof. Wang emphasised the need for upscaling: “We used a demo with customised (lab) chip. The next step to move closer to the market is upscaling. We should implement a demo with mass-production chips, showing that the functionality and cost-efficiency remain positive.”
The recognition of 6G-REFERENCE and ETH Zürich’s TMA technology underscores the project’s strategic value to the European research landscape and its contribution to sustainable, high-performance, and scalable 6G systems.