Pre-tested, integrated Radio gives engineers more freedom
Network software vendor Mavenir and systems integrator Aspire Technology are speed testing Remote Radiohead Units (RRUs) in the latter’s Open Networks Lab in Dublin, with a views to getting these O-RAN compliant split 7.2 units on the market soon.
Telcos need integrated kit that works out that box, not the sort of prima donna cloud klutz nonsense that keeps everyone waiting while an engineer has to explore every possible combination of options in the configuration menu, according Aspire. That sort of reliability and predictability comes at a cost, such as being in hock to a proprietary vendor. In advertising this is called ‘the freedom of a tight brief’ and the Aspire-Mavenir pact aims to achieve the same liberation for telco engineers.
Ravenir and Aspire are trying to create the best of all network worlds – open systems that work out the box, Declan Friel, Aspire’s CTO, seemed to be saying: “Our focus has been to accelerate the ORAN ecosystem development and to support CSPs. This will allow them to fully realize the benefits of Telco Cloud, Service Management & Orchestration and Open RAN, in terms of flexibility, performance and cost,” said Friel.
The challenge is that cloud-native Centralized Unit (CU) and Distributed Unit (DU) RAN software stacksare growing fast, fuelled by modernisation and expanding networks, as well as private networks and indoor projects. The number of O-RAN compliant RRUs is mushrooming. Sophisticated, and hence infuriatingly complex, products are presenting themselves as options across the spectrum of different radio technologies, including Massive MIMO (mMIMO) and millimeter Wave (mmWave), according to Puneet Sethi, SVP/GM RAN Business for Mavenir.
Open RAN has accelerated to the point where you need ‘go-to-market’ models, said Sethi.