Samsung is playing the software card in its bid to capitalize on Huawei’s exclusion from many national 5G roll-outs and seize a far larger share of the infrastructure market than it gained in previous cellular generations. The company claims to have taken SDN (software-defined networking) for 5G to a new level with an end-end approach integrating the RAN fully with the backhaul and core, while offering greater levels of automation, resilience and security. It is setting up SDN as the foundation for implementing network slicing, which it regards as the biggest single benefit 5G will bring, underlying many use cases and enabling operators to compete with emerging providers in provision of flexible, differentiated services, as well as in private enterprise…