CSPs flag open RAN progress

Communications services providers (CSP) issued a flurry of open radio access network (RAN) news ahead of Mobile World Congress (MWC) next week, with updates on a major trial in Germany, a network sharing collaboration between two CSPs, and an open RAN wish‑list for 2023.

Deutsche Telekom (DT) kicked off the week with a white paper containing the key learnings from its O-RAN Town project in Neubrandenburg. Launched in June 2021 with support from Mavenir, Dell Technologies, Intel, NEC and Fujitsu, the primary objective of O-RAN Town was to achieve the deployment of a “truly multi‑vendor open RAN solution” based on O-RAN Alliance specifications.

The results of the trial appear largely, but not entirely, positive. For instance, DT is now even more aware than before of the complexities that a fully integrated, multi-vendor open RAN project entails. While the German CSP said the results and experience gained during the O-RAN Town trial “reaffirm our commitment” to make open RAN “the technology of choice for future networks”, it admitted that open RAN technology is not yet mature enough for widescale deployment.

“Based on our experience … we expect that a smaller scale, multi‑vendor open fronthaul‑based deployment capable of supporting all Deutsche Telekom services is realistic by the end of 2023,” DT said. The CSP also confirmed it has been qualifying vendors in preparation for an initial commercial rollout of open RAN from 2023/24.

To-do list for 2023

Meanwhile, DT has contributed its learnings to the open RAN MoU group of European operators that is advancing various aspects of the open RAN ecosystem. The group, which also includes Orange, Telecom Italia (TIM), Telefónica, and Vodafone, has just published a new report that addresses current concerns and lists key priorities for 2023.

The Open RAN MoU Progress Update on Maturity, Security and Energy Efficiency noted that global open RAN deployments are now reaching tens of thousands of sites, although mostly in greenfield deployments, and declared that open RAN is closing the gap with traditional RANs in terms of feature parity and performance. More pilots are planned this year, and full-scale deployments across Europe are anticipated in 2025.

However, the report notes that discussions on maturity, security and energy efficiency are becoming increasingly important.

Key focus areas in 2023 include assisting with the development of open RAN technologies to allow for wider deployment in highly populated towns and cities than is currently possible; strengthening cooperation with national authorities on security, including the European Union Agency for Cybersecurity (ENISA); and enhancing energy efficiency of all components, with particular focus on the radio transmitters and cloud infrastructure.

One notable comment was made by Michaël Trabbia, chief technology and innovation officer at Orange, who said open and cloud-native RAN “is now geared up for first commercial deployments in brownfield networks within Europe from 2023 onwards”.

“In the long run, we also have a clear path set up with an efficient framework to ease the integration burden, opening the door for deployments at scale. Eventually, we expect open RAN to even outperform traditional RAN, allowing us to reap the benefits of fully automated and intelligent networks,” Trabbia added.

Romania pilot

For its part, Orange has also just agreed to cooperate with Vodafone on open RAN network sharing in rural parts of Europe where they both have networks.

Romania is set to be the first market where commercial sites will be deployed under this agreement in 2023. The two CSPs are currently working on the vendor selection process, and eventually intend to extend the “open RAN sharing blueprint” to other markets. The two CSPs also both operate mobile networks in Spain.

Trabbia said open RAN “is a great opportunity to take network sharing to a whole new dimension, with even higher operator differentiation thanks to the ability for each of the partners to tune its network more independently”.

Alberto Ripepi, chief network officer of Vodafone, added that the two operators will be able to reduce the cost of hardware, minimize fuel consumption and the need for duplicate sites whilst eradicating coverage not‑spots.

“Open RAN also means we can more quickly add new software features without necessarily replacing the hardware components, which is often the case today. This minimizes any disruption to service and ensures customers in rural areas receive the same upgrades as those in the cities,” Ripepi added.