The threat of more governments blocking Huawei and ZTE from bidding for 5G infrastructure contracts (see separate item) has thrown a harsh spotlight on one of the myths of 5G. There have been high hopes that the 5G network would turn out to be more open than its predecessors, making it easier for operators to mix equipment from multiple vendors in the same network zones. In fact, not only does it look as awkward as ever to deploy a multivendor RAN, but backwards compatibility – a key claim of successive 3GPP standards generations – is less than perfect too. This has been highlighted as an issue because operators which have 4G RANs supplied by Huawei or ZTE are saying it…