The Small Cell Forum has released a new addition to its FAPI (Functional API) family of interfaces, which is designed to provision Layer 1 system-on-chip (SoCs) with management plane capabilities for Open Fronthaul, the initial specification devised by the O-RAN Alliance. The new spec provides some bridging between the two organizations’ preferred 3GPP functional splits (which define how MAC and PHY layer functions are split across the radio unit and the virtualized baseband in a vRAN). SCF has mainly focused on Split 6, in which Layer 1 functions are deployed on the RU, and O-RAN Alliance on Split 7.2, which divides Layer 1 between the RU and the baseband. The spec is officially called SCF229 FAPI operations, administration and maintenance…