Who did what · chapter 3 of 7 · 5 minutes
3 The map of the groups, and where the weight sat
Sixteen groups, 10771 documents, 179 meetings — who filed what, who wrote the most letters, and the trap that makes these counts easy to add up wrongly.
3.1 How big the area is
Ambient IoT is not one document and not one group. The size of it, counted out of the document database on this machine, is five numbers.
-
16 groups filed Ambient IoT documents. [1]
-
10771 documents in total. [2]
-
Across 179 meetings. [3]
-
From 900 different sources — a source being the company or the group that sent the document. [4]
-
Against 37 work items and study items [5], ten of which are studies. [6]
3.2 Every group in the register, counted
The table below is the whole map. It is the register's own, one row per group, and it holds a seventeenth row that filed nothing.
| Group | Documents | Meetings | Letters sent | Work items led | Specs owned | First | Last |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| RAN1 RAN1 | 2421 | 16 | 36 | 4 | 2 | 2024-02-15 | 2026-06-10 |
| SA2 SA2 | 2125 | 17 | 139 | 4 | 5 | 2024-01-11 | 2026-06-02 |
| SA3 SA3 | 1349 | 15 | 38 | 4 | 3 | 2024-04-07 | 2026-05-29 |
| RAN2 RAN2 | 996 | 14 | 38 | 0 | 2 | 2024-04-03 | 2026-05-22 |
| RAN3 RAN3 | 805 | 15 | 30 | 0 | 5 | 2024-04-05 | 2026-07-30 |
| RAN4 RAN4 | 737 | 14 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 2024-04-08 | 2026-05-29 |
| SA1 SA1 | 529 | 14 | 10 | 2 | 3 | 2022-04-29 | 2025-05-09 |
| CT1 CT1 | 508 | 8 | 24 | 2 | 3 | 2025-04-24 | 2026-07-08 |
| CT4 CT4 | 387 | 12 | 25 | 2 | 9 | 2024-08-09 | 2026-05-22 |
| RAN RAN | 315 | 14 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2022-12-02 | 2026-06-04 |
| SA6 SA6 | 247 | 6 | 0 | 2 | 4 | 2025-08-17 | 2026-05-25 |
| CT3 CT3 | 172 | 8 | 0 | 3 | 2 | 2025-03-31 | 2026-05-26 |
| RAN5 RAN5 | 58 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2026-01-30 | 2026-06-11 |
| SA SA | 55 | 12 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 2022-12-07 | 2026-06-02 |
| SA5 SA5 | 36 | 7 | 0 | 3 | 7 | 2025-02-07 | 2026-07-01 |
| CT CT | 31 | 5 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2025-05-29 | 2026-06-01 |
| CT6 CT6 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 0 | — | — |
Three of those rows are plenaries rather than working groups: RAN, SA and CT. RAN SA CT Their small counts are the point — a plenary signs work off, it does not draft it.
3.3 Where the weight sat
Two groups carry more of the 10771 documents than any others. [2] RAN1, the radio group, filed 2421 RAN1; SA2, the architecture group, filed 2125 SA2. Nothing else comes close.
The order after that is SA3 with 1349, RAN2 with 996, RAN3 with 805 and RAN4 with 737. SA3 RAN2 RAN3 RAN4
The dates in the last two columns tell a second story. SA1, the requirements group, starts first, on 2022-04-29 — the two plenaries follow that December — and it is the only group that has stopped, its last Ambient IoT document dated 2025-05-09. SA1 RAN SA
RAN5, which does conformance testing, is the newest arrival: its first document is dated 2026-01-30. RAN5 Work moves down the chain, and the record shows it moving.
3.4 The letters between groups
An area that crosses this many groups runs on letters. There are 351 of them in the data. [7]
SA2 sent 139 of them — more than any other group by a wide margin. The next two, SA3 and RAN2, sent 38 each. SA2 SA3 RAN2
That is what being the architecture group looks like from the outside: it is the group everybody else has to be told things by, and told things about.
3.5 The trap in these counts
The document figures against a work item are counted per short name, not per
work item, and four of the CT items share the short name AmbientIoT-CT. Each of
the four therefore shows the same 959 documents. AmbientIoT-CT
AmbientIoT-CT
The same holds for the two items called FS_AmbientIoT and the two called
AmbientIoT. Adding those figures together produces a number that means
nothing.
3.6 Two oddities worth knowing about
CT6 leads a work item and has filed no document. It is the seventeenth group in the register, and the only one whose whole row is zeros. The data says that much and no more — not whether the work has not started, nor whether it is filed under a name this register does not see. CT6 AmbientIoT_Ph2-CT
CT4 owns more of the affected specifications than anybody. Nine, against SA5's seven and five each for SA2 and RAN3, on 387 documents — a small share of the paper and a large share of the documents that had to change. CT4 SA5 SA2 RAN3
3.7 Where to read this yourself
Each group's entry in the register carries the address of that group's own document folder on 3gpp.org, its first and last Ambient IoT meeting, and the work items it leads. SA2 RAN1 CT1
The specifications those groups own are named in The specifications this work touches, and the busiest of them is TS 23.369, with 524 change requests. TS 23.369
This school does not carry the text of that document or of any other. It points you at the number and leaves the reading to 3gpp.org.
Where the numbers in this chapter come from
- 16 groups filed Ambient IoT documents distinct document-number prefixes over the Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc`; the prefix is the group that produced the document, read 2026-08-04
- 10771 Ambient IoT documents rows of `tdoc` in api.sqlite whose work item column names one of the 28 Ambient IoT work item acronyms, read 2026-08-04
- 179 meetings carried Ambient IoT documents distinct values of the meeting column over the Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc`, read 2026-08-04
- 900 different sources filed Ambient IoT documents distinct values of the source column over the Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc`; a source is the company or the group that sent the document, read 2026-08-04
- 37 Ambient IoT work items and study items folders under /var/www/whatthespec.net/data/data/wis whose metadata.json carries an acronym matching AmbientIoT, Ambient_IoT or AIoT; all 9406 folders were read and 5 other 'ambient' items were rejected, read 2026-08-04
- 10 of them are studies of the work items above, the ones whose acronym starts FS_, which is how 3GPP marks a feasibility study, read 2026-08-04
- 351 Ambient IoT documents of type LS out Ambient IoT rows of `tdoc` whose type column is 'LS out', read 2026-08-04
Check yourself
Answers appear when you pick one, with where they come from.
Q3.1 Which two groups filed the most Ambient IoT documents?
RAN1 filed 2421 and SA2 filed 2125. The next group, SA3, filed 1349. RAN1
Q3.2 Which group sent by far the most letters to other groups?
SA2 sent 139. The next two, SA3 and RAN2, sent 38 each. SA2
Q3.3 Four CT work items each show 959 documents. What does that mean?
Document counts are per short name. Four work items share the short name AmbientIoT-CT, so each shows the same figure. Adding them is wrong. AmbientIoT-CT
Q3.4 What is unusual about CT6 in this data?
CT6 is the seventeenth group in the register and leads a work item, but the data holds no document from it. The data does not say why. CT6
Q3.5 Which group's Ambient IoT documents stop earliest?
SA1 started first, in 2022, and filed its last Ambient IoT document on 2025-05-09. Requirements work finishes before the rest. SA1
This chapter was built from a source register generated 2026-08-04. A fresher build of the register may hold different numbers.