Open RAN platforms such as those from the ORAN Alliance and Telecom Infra Project (TIP) remain immature but they are gathering real momentum from the support of high profile operators. The latest is the United Arab Emirates’ Etisalat, which has launched a network using virtualized, disaggregated and open RAN technologies, supported by a group of suppliers including Altiostar, Cisco and NEC. All three vendors are also part of the long supplier list for Rakuten’s more ambitious end-to-end cloud-native roll-out in Japan, and that may indicate the prestige that suppliers to that project have acquired, despite the challenges the deployment has suffered. Rakuten is implementing technology that complies with the ORAN Alliance specifications for an open, cloud-based radio network, as is…