One of the other trends fueling the push for disaggregated RAN adoption deployment is Multi-access Edge Computing (MEC). As cloud solutions grew and the 4th Industrial Revolution gained ground, industries and operators alike recognized the need for increased computing demands delivered with greater speed and lower latency, which could be achieved by pushing compute from the data center out to the network's edge. Operators realized that, given RAN functions, MEC can colocate at some edge locations, allowing them to provide increased network services where central office-based solutions could not.
As industry initiatives demonstrated the viability of a disaggregated RAN, operators began looking for vendors capable of enabling a disaggregated RAN. This led to a number of vendor companies forming their own initiatives to develop their ecosystems and promote interoperability among their partners.
A bunch of operators get together to push 5G and MEC interoperability
All of the above is good news for operators looking for open RAN solutions and for vendors enabling this evolution. Because the specifications are focused on interoperability, operators can look for solutions that meet their needs while vendors are able to develop and innovate products within their area of expertise.
"NewEdge is at the forefront of the Open RAN movement being embraced by mobile operators around the world, was an early participant in the Telecom Infra Project (TIP) and a founding member of the Open RAN Policy Coalition," said Tom Lambalot, CEO of NewEdge Signal Solutions. "To ensure seamless interoperability with a respective DU (Distributed Unit), we are engaging with leading OpenRAN participants that are more focused on the software elements of the network architecture, including Parallel Wireless. As 5G continues to roll out, we are benefiting from the investments we have made in the core technologies required of a best-in-class Radio Unit offering. Our broadband Radio Units, agile in both frequency and air interface, are ideally suited to the demands of an everchanging spectrum environment. Future trends including CBRS spectrum sharing and the recent announcement by the Department of Defense will only bolster demand."
The Forum has extended one of its most successful specifications, the Functional API (FAPI) multi-vendor platform interface that has led to the accelerated deployments of small cells, to a virtualized small cell architecture, with the addition of nFAPI. nFAPI, a set of interfaces for supporting a virtualised MAC/PHY split will be pivatol in ensuring future interoperability for virtual small cell networks, enabling multivendor C-RAN economics today as well as a smooth evolution path to 5G. This unified framework which allows small cells from different vendors to work together seamlessly, enabling operators to deploy dense networks that will be interoperable and future-proof, and can combine physical and virtual elements.
"We haven't seen a major concerted push for multi-vendor 5G test-bed environments to help bring together the hundreds of vendors it will take to make 5G services successful," said Peter Dougherty, CEO of MantisNet, a network observability platform.
I will risk my opinion, that those solutions will be at the end of 5G road map for most of the operators, due to economic reasons. It will be, as long as the application development industry do not start to push operators for the MEC infrastructure/interface localised delivery, chicken and egg" case :-).
THOR is a fully functional 5G network combined with an edge compute platform, capable of completely isolated operations during an emergency response. Some of the use cases that we are currently exploring are search and rescue operations using drones, situational awareness using location-based capabilities and mission-critical push-to-talk service combined with interoperability with Land Mobile Radio/Professional Mobile Radio (LMR/PMR) systems. Once we have an advanced platform like 5G and edge compute at our disposal, the potential to roll out new capabilities is endless.
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