Swisscom has appointed Ericsson to overhaul its core network in Switzerland.
The Swedish vendor will take a full stack telecom cloud solution from Ericsson for its core network functions, covering network functions virtualisation (NFV) and software-defined networking (SDN), the pair announced at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona.
It follows a similar agreement with Telstra in Australia, where Ericsson has been recruited to ready its network for 5G and internet of things (IoT) services.
The Swisscom announcement used much the same language. Through virtualisation, it said Swisscom will be able to scale its network according to different services, and develop consumer propositions at a faster rate. It also said the operator will be able to address a wider range of enterprises and sectors by developing new IoT and 5G applications.
Under the terms of the agreement, Ericsson will deliver a range of solutions to Swisscom.
These include its Hyperscale Datacentre System 8000, which uses disaggregated hardware for better use of resources; its OpenStack-based Cloud Execution Environment, which supports virtual network functions from third parties; its Cloud SDN, which brings programmability and automation to networks; and its Network Manager, which allows orchestration of both physical and virtual networks.
Ericsson will also supply of a virtual evolved packet core (vEPC) and virtual IP multimedia subsystem (IMS).
Daniel Staub, Head of Joint Mobile Group at Swisscom, said: “Our collaboration with Ericsson has already [had an] impact on main components like radio access and mobile core [networks]. It now also [has an impact] on the NFV, which will bring our customers additional benefits like simplified scaling of hardware elements as well as speed and agility in their product development.”
Anders Lindblad, Head of Business Unit Cloud and IP at Ericsson, said: “By bringing agility, efficiency and speed to networks everywhere, [the] cloud is a key enabler of the ‘networked society’. This agreement with Swisscom is a great example of how Ericsson’s cloud transformation capabilities help our customers to capture these benefits and turn them into effective differentiators.”