11534 search results for Open RAN

Orange France picks Ericsson for 5G real time charging  Orange France has signed a five-year agreement to make Ericsson Charging its strategic monetization platform for its 5G subscribers, setting the stage for more advanced services that exploit 5G Standalone (SA) capabilities scheduled for launch in 2023.     The cloud-native Ericsson Charging solution will serve nearly 28m Orange France customers, as well as private mobile radio users and 20m IoT devices, through a software container-based system using Ericsson Cloud Native Infrastructure Solution (CNIS). Ericsson Charging will be integrated with legacy business-to-consumer (B2C) and business-to-business (B2B) billing platforms.     The foundation for this move came in 2019 when Orange France selected Ericsson as its BSS provider for real time online charging system…

Analysts at Wireless Watch’s sister service, Faultline, have recently raised concerns that RDK Management – the open source smart home software group – is stalling on its pledge to include the WiFi Alliance’s EasyMesh standard in its framework.     A year after EasyMesh was added to the RDK-B roadmap for the next generation of the connected home software platform, there were no signs of integration of the technology being in motion, even though tier 1 operators and WiFi technology vendors were indicating they were ready to embrace EasyMesh in upcoming router software stacks.    However, the radio silence has now been ended by Turkish WiFi management specialist Airties, which has contributed its WiFi EasyMesh controller software module as a…

Taiwan’s HTC may be best known for handsets, but as it has lost share in that market, it has taken its wireless expertise into other segments, such as small cells. The company demonstrated a ‘network-in-a-box’, branded Reign Core, for private wireless at February’s Mobile World Congress and the same product was on show at Dish’s event last week, where it launched its first commercial 5G network.    HTC said it was working with Dish “to bring low-latency, high-bandwidth private 5G connectivity to enterprise customers across the USA”. Its Reign Core includes a 5G core, O-RAN compliant remote radio unit and baseband, and a Layer 3 switch, all of which can fit into a suitcase.     Venkata Movva, HTC’s director of VR,…

Telefónica’s acquisition of Austrian cloud software provider and integrator BE-terna, for up to €350m, depending on future earnings, gives a clear indication of the telco’s enterprise strategy, as well as indirectly highlighting the relative positions of the three big hyperscalers, Microsoft Azure, Amazon Web Services and Google Cloud.     The acquisition, made by Telefónica Tech, the telco’s enterprise division, also dovetails with the partnership unveiled in March 2022 with Israel’s Pente Networks. This revolves around the latter’s enterprise LTE/5G platform and aims to develop a managed 5G Cloud service to facilitate emerging applications for enterprises, that the operator likes to describe as “transformational use cases”.    These two companies had already developed joint products that combine 5G connectivity with on-premise…

Nokia has strived to make cybersecurity a differentiator in 5G by building on the capabilities it acquired in Bell Labs when it took over Alcatel-Lucent in November 2016.     This deal strengthened its portfolio in that field with various technologies and patents. Since then, Nokia has maintained momentum through various initiatives, setting out not just to support emerging 5G security capabilities as they come along in the standards, but to offer additional layers of protection with the argument that 5G will expose operators and their customers to new threats and more concerted attacks from various quarters, including hostile states, organized crime, terrorists and lone actors.     The underlying thesis is that, as 5G rolls out around the world and converges…

Only a small number of start-ups in the mobile industry achieve instant breakthrough, especially if they focus on chips or equipment. This is not the world of apps or web services, where a small investment and some clever marketing can create a sensation, and attract a skyhigh valuation. Companies focused on wireless infrastructure are more likely to have to adopt the old motto – ‘if at first you don’t succeed, try, try and try again’.    An example is Artemis Networks, whose CEO, Steve Perlman, first unveiled the pCell (personal cell) back in 2014, claiming it would make conventional 4G redundant. Bold claims persisted – in 2020 he claimed the pCell enabled networks that were faster than 5G. But behind…

Samsung has set out its own view of the roadmap to 6G in a white paper, ‘6G Spectrum: Expanding the Frontier’, calling for a huge expansion of millimeter wave spectrum availability to support the innovations that the industry can deliver.     Last time Samsung offered significant details about its 6G R&D efforts and vision was in mid-2020, when it published its first white paper on the topic, though last fall it also made a pledge to invest $205bn over three years in chips for advanced technologies, including 6G. In 2020, Samsung was also focusing on high frequency spectrum, including the sub-Terahertz bands around 100 GHz. However, even two years ago, the discussion seemed bluesky and somewhat abstract, whereas in mid-2022,…

So much of the conversation about open network centers on the RAN that it is easy to forget the equally innovative attempts that are being made, often led by start-ups, to open up the transport network. Indeed, a recent survey of almost 80 operators by Rethink Technology Research revealed that 35% believed an open network strategy would only deliver the full commercial benefits targeted, if it were planned from end to end; while a further 27% said an end to end approach would be “highly beneficial”.     Complexity arises in the transport domain because it has so many elements, from RAN xHaul to metro and core switching and routing, to subsea cables. Many operators will use third party infrastructure in…

Even before it was acquired by AMD in a $49bn deal earlier this year, Xilinx had proclaimed that it was “no longer an FPGA company”. Not only did it have other product lines, notably in RF, but it had developed a flexible architecture that took in different kinds of chip, alongside the field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) it had pioneered.    Now part of a larger company that made its fortune in central processors (CPUs), AMD, Xilinx has an even more multi-faceted story for its markets, including one of its key targets, 5G infrastructure. Last week it unveiled its latest radio chip, the Zynq UltraScale+, which takes it several steps away from an FPGA-only platform. This is an RF system-on-chip…

Special Report: 5G/6G innovations    In the pre-commercial run-up to a new generation of mobile networks, a large number of innovative ideas inevitably surface, from large companies, start-ups and open initiatives. But while these can point the way to the future platforms, many fall by the wayside because they are not sufficiently robust when deployed for real, or they are not sufficiently aligned with a firm business case.    A more interesting set of innovations may, then, be seen when the new generation, in this case 5G, is starting to be deployed at some scale, and the economics and technologies are better understood in the real world. And yet, there is still plenty of room for creativity and new ideas,…

Broadband and TV provider Sky was supposed to have done away with satellite TV delivery by now. It started testing its all-IP video model in Switzerland back in 2017, and then its streaming revolution spread across Europe like wildfire. So why has the Comcast-owned European operator just inked another landmark satellite capacity extension deal with satellite operator SES in the UK and Republic of Ireland, running until 2028?    It seems Sky has made a misjudgement, assuming that it could waltz into the streaming octagon unchallenged by technologies and market headwinds. In fact, the transition to IP-based, set top-free viewing is well underway, as evidenced by last year’s release of the Sky Glass smart TV, among other streaming devices. Yet…

 Last week, the FCC granted 4,041 licences to winners in the 3.45 GHz auction, which ended at the start of this year, even as the US regulator prepares to release further airwaves in 2022.    The auction was largely overshadowed by the huge C-band sale in 2021, and was seen a an incremental sale, but in fact its gross proceeds, at $22.5bn, made it the third largest in US history.     Jessica Rosenworcel, the FCC’s chair, said the 3.45 GHz auction, or Auction 110, has achieved its goal of improving service provider diversity and boosting competition. “The results speak for themselves,” she said. “The licences we are granting today represent a wider variety of providers, including small businesses and rural…

The UK government has announced four principles for development and deployment of Open RAN systems, to encourage interoperability and reduce chance of over-dominance by a few major vendors.     The government stated there was a need for clarity on design characteristics of Open RAN, especially the adoption of standards and demonstration of interoperability between components. The aim is to ensure future government investment in Open RAN R&D will provide value for money and encourage innovation across the supply chain.    The four principles are:   open disaggregation, allowing elements of the RAN to be sourced from different suppliers  standards-based compliance, allowing all suppliers to test systems in an open, neutral environment  interoperability, ensuring disaggregated elements work together as a fully functional…