Telecoms operators have some natural advantages in addressing the rising demand for edge computing to support applications that must tick demanding boxes in terms of security and privacy, responsiveness or availability. They have readymade locations in which to install edge data centers – repurposed central offices or even cell sites – and an investment in edge infrastructure can support multiple business cases, from supporting a distributed virtualized RAN and core, to improving performance of core services such as video streaming, to enabling new revenue streams from enterprises which want to run applications on a public, rather than on-premise, edge.
However, as we have often analyzed in Wireless Watch, most operators will hesitate to deploy the density of edge infrastructure that may be required for certain enterprise and urban services, and they will usually need partnerships to ensure they have international reach and access to a broad developer ecosystem. Alliances with the webscalers will be important, and are driving success for Google with its new mobile edge cloud platform. But they bring the risk of the operator being consigned to the role of dumb pipe, and so a more diverse set of players, with telcos in the driving seat, may emerge in some markets.
Tower operators potentially have a major role to play if the vision of an edge aligned with telecoms infrastructure and services is to become real. Most of the early work has been done in the USA, where Crown Castle and SBA, in particular, have formed partnerships with edge cloud deployers such as Packet (now part of data center neutral host Equinix) and Vapor.io.
Now pan-European towerco Cellnex has announced its own edge partnership, with Lenovo and NearbyComp. Cellnex has been expanding rapidly in geographical terms with a string of acquisitions of tower assets in many markets, but it is also one of the most active towercos in extending the business model into adjacent areas like small cells, smart cities and now edge – any market in which a neutral host, telco-focused approach could be stretched to draw in new revenues and customers.
The three companies have launched a combination of location, Intel-based hardware and network management to provide infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) specifically targeted at improving the 5G/edge business case for MNOs. In particular, it promises to take away the headache and cost of coordinating and managing large numbers of edge nodes.
Lenovo’s contribution combines its ThinkSystem SR650 and ThinkSystem SE350 hardware with its Open Cloud Automation (LOC-A) software to support automated deployment and management. The SE350 is Lenovo’s first edge-specific server, ruggedized for non-data center environments and with simplified local and remote management, and security, capabilities.
Nearby Computing is providing NearbyOne, its edge-specific cloud-native orchestration tool, which works with large hybrid clouds and enables deployment automation and application lifecycle management services.
Cellnex will act as the neutral host with a turnkey solution based in a variety of its locations, including data centers and towers.
worThe solution was co-developed with Intel, which sees a proliferation of edge nodes as a good opportunity for growth in its core server processor market. To converge workloads on a single platform and control them with AI-assisted intelligence, the platform uses Intel’s distribution of the OpenVINO Toolkit for AI inferencing and there are plans to incorporate OpenNESS for networking workloads in the future.
Cellnex says the approach is modular and scalable, so it can be tailored for small or large areas and different types of location.
“This edge computing solution is designed to help mobile operators lower their TCO, while supporting exciting new visual use cases for different vertical segments. As a scalable and modular solution, it can cover many different scenarios, from dedicated on premise deployments, to distributed telco edge services for consumer market”, said Óscar Pallarols, global commercial director at Cellnex.
Some of the edge solutions have been implemented in Cellnex’s home city of Barcelona, Spain to pilot use cases including enterprise applications, music and sports events, and a Green Edge built around a zero-emissions site.