NEC and Qualcomm are both looking to Open RAN to propel them into new markets – NEC to build a RAN equipment business outside Japan, Qualcomm to re-enter the macro network infrastructure world after a long absence. So it is unsurprising that these two companies have joined forces in an alliance to develop a 5G Open RAN distributed unit (DU). The virtualized DU is one of the most challenging elements of an Open RAN, because it needs to handle very demanding Layer 1 5G network processes such as beamforming, which puts considerable pressure on the processor. Qualcomm is one of the chip companies that is developing specialized accelerators to enable a DU to run effectively on merchant silicon rather than…