Vodafone has become one of the most prominent advocates of Open RAN, but now seems to be applying the same logic of disaggregated networks and new supply chains to the fixed broadband network. The days of Vodafone being primarily a mobile operator are long gone, of course, and now it is examining how to apply common cloud architectures across different access and transport infrastructures, and how to approach future convergence, especially in major fixed/mobile markets like Germany. Its latest activity focuses on the broadband network gateway (BNG), and it is claiming the first test implementation of the Broadband Forum’s (BBF’s) TR-459 standard, which enables control/user plane separation (CUPS) in the BNG for the first time. CUPS, which has started to…