It’s been a busy couple of weeks for open RAN architectures. The US regulator, the FCC, said open RAN architectures would be eligible for its ‘rip-and-replace’ programme, which provides support for smaller carriers to remove Huawei or ZTE equipment from their networks. However, the agency did not mention any specific suppliers, though the sort of rural and regional providers which have commonly bought Chinese gear could be a strong target for emerging open RAN platforms. These are not deemed ready to power heavily loaded, ultra-resilient macro networks – unless heavily customized like Rakuten’s roll-out – but they are already playing a significant role in trials and deployments for more localized platforms such as rural extensions or enterprise and indoor networks.…