ETSI, Japan and South Korea sign letter of intent to explore a 3GPP-style AI standards partnership

ETSI, Japan’s Telecommunication Technology Committee (TTC) and South Korea’s Telecommunications Technology Association (TTA) signed a letter of intent on November 2, 2026, to explore the creation of a new global, industry-led partnership for AI standardisation. The proposed name is the AI Partnership Project, or AIPP, and the model is the collaborative partnership behind successive generations of global mobile communications, 3GPP. The announcement was datelined Sophia Antipolis, France.

The letter of intent does not create the partnership. It commits the three organisations to explore the options for a possible AIPP and to enable preliminary activities towards a new industry-led AI standardisation model. Telecompaper, reporting the announcement on November 2, described it as a deal to look at the potential benefits of a global AI specifications alliance moulded on the 3GPP cellular partnership.

A 3GPP model for AI#

Why reach for 3GPP? ETSI’s case is that the partnership model shaped successive generations of global mobile communications — separate organisations and companies aligning on shared specifications so networks and devices interoperate. Applied to AI, the hope, as ETSI puts it, is a platform where industry, academia and research communities align priorities and accelerate standards development, so AI technologies deploy with the trust, interoperability and scalability needed for widespread adoption.

Markus Mueck, chair of the ETSI board, said: “Artificial Intelligence is evolving at unprecedented speed, making global collaboration on standards more critical than ever.” He added that an AI Partnership Project can complement the existing AI ecosystem, rather than replace it — a point ETSI repeats: the exploration is meant to complement existing standardisation efforts, with a focus on practical results.

Bettina Funk, chair of the ETSI General Assembly, said: “Global cooperation is essential in AI standardisation, even if priorities and expectations are not always the same.” Exploring a partnership with Japan and South Korea, she said, offers an opportunity to make progress on practical standards that respond to real needs and to bring in valuable new perspectives.

What was agreed — and who is invited#

So far, three signatories: ETSI, the TTA and the TTC. The announcement names no other founding partners and publishes no list of topics, working groups or timetable. What it does publish is an open invitation. Jan Ellsberger, ETSI’s director general, called the signing an important milestone in strengthening international cooperation on AI standardisation, and added: “We invite partners and standards shapers worldwide to join forces in advancing globally aligned standards for trustworthy AI.”

ETSI itself is one of only three bodies officially recognised by the European Union as a European Standards Organisation. It describes itself as an independent, not-for-profit body with over 900 member organisations from more than 60 countries, spanning companies, research institutions, academia, governments and public organisations. That membership is the audience the exploration is aimed at first — but the invitation in the announcement is explicitly worldwide.

What it is not — yet#

The release frames the move against calls from leading AI companies for common global standards to help ensure rapidly advancing AI remains safe, interoperable and human centric, and cites President Ursula von der Leyen’s argument at the Tallinn Digital Summit that European standards become global standards through engagement with trusted partners. The letter of intent is the first step in that engagement for these three bodies — not the standard itself.

Three questions will decide whether this amounts to more than a letter. First, who joins: does the worldwide invitation bring in other standards bodies, companies and researchers, or does the exploration stay a three-body exercise? Second, scope: which practical AI topics come first, and how does the work avoid duplicating the existing standardisation ecosystem it is meant to complement? Third, form: does the exploration become a partnership with its own structure and outputs, on anything like the 3GPP pattern? None of those answers is in today’s announcement, and none should be assumed. For now, the news is narrow and real: three standards bodies have formally agreed to explore building one.