Author: Bob O’Donnell, President and Chief Analyst, TECHnalysis Research, LLC
As the telecom industry starts to move towards the middle years of the 5G era, there’s been some efforts by industry watchers to assess the progress that’s been made so far, as well as look forward to determine what still needs to be done.
One of the key areas being analyzed is the evolution of the radio access network (RAN) that provides the essential connections to modern cellular networks. After all, it’s the RAN where some of the most critical—and unique—technologies that enable 5G networks and separate them from 4G networks live and function. Support for radio frequency (RF) spectrum first introduced for 5G, the integration of antenna advancements like massive MIMO and beamforming, and more are all key parts of 5G networks—whether they’re standalone (SA) or non-standalone (NSA).
The RAN is also where some important architectural changes to network infrastructure have started to make an impact. Notably, the ability to evolve from single vendor network appliance devices attached together in proprietary solutions to virtualized, software-based networks with open interfaces running on traditional computer industry servers has led to a dramatic recasting of how telco operators are building and now managing their wireless networks.
In truth, some of these efforts towards a software-based, virtualized network started to happen late in the 4G era. With the move to 5G, however, virtually every telco company around the world recognized that it was the perfect opportunity to make this move because of the increased flexibility, improved manageability, and enhanced options for automation that this new type of architecture enabled.
As a result, there’s been a strong move towards virtualized RAN, or vRAN, architectures in carriers across the US, Europe, and Asia. Transitions like these take time, however, because of the critical nature of telco networks and their essential need for stability and reliability. Right or wrong, the telco companies tend to take these transitions at a conservative, utility-like pace as opposed to the rapid-fire rate of many tech industry evolutions. The net result is that these processes are being measured in years, not months, which has led some to wonder why progress in 5G network capabilities hasn’t been faster.
Despite these concerns, it is starting to become clear that the impact is being felt. A major US carrier, for example, recently said that over 60% of their network traffic was travelling over a virtualized RAN architecture. That’s a big step forward and highlights that progress is indeed being made.
In addition, we’re starting to see more interest in some of the new opportunities that these software-defined network architectures can enable. For one, it opens up the option to bring a larger range of suppliers into the network equipment ecosystem. Over the last few years, for example, we’ve seen big IT companies like Dell and HPE create servers built on Intel processors that can run critical parts of a RAN. Working in conjunction with companies like Samsung Networks, who offer software that creates virtualized DUs (Distributed Units) and CUs (Centralized Units), this enables telcos to move away from proprietary network appliance hardware to these more, modern flexible designs. Plus, because they’re leveraging cloud-native container-based software architectures in their vRAN software, they can leverage the huge range of tools and features (e.g., DevOps) that have been developed to make the process of writing, testing, and updating that software faster and easier.
These tools also open the possibility of working with other tech companies. Recently, for example, Samsung Networks announced a partnership with AMD in which AMD’s latest Epyc 8004 series server CPUs, which were specifically designed for telco applications, will be capable of running Samsung’s vRAN software. This provides yet more choice for telco companies who want to work with a wider variety of partners. One other interesting aspect of these new AMD chips is that they were architected to run at lower power levels, which means they can help operators reduce the large electricity demands that their networks currently demand. This is particularly helpful in conjunction with Samsung’s latest vRAN 3.0 software, which also incorporates a number of power-saving features. Given the intense scrutiny that many companies are under to reduce their carbon emissions, this could be very important for the long term.
Yet another type of evolution in the world of RAN is the concept of Open RAN or ORAN. The idea with ORAN is to have a set of agreed upon industry standards for connectivity that would allow an even broader range of companies to participate in the network equipment market. Progress on multi-vendor ORAN has been a bit slower than some initially expected, in part because of the challenge of coordinating the efforts (and support) across multiple vendors. What has started to happen, though, is network vendors are starting to enable support for these open standards in their own products, making the connections between multiple products from the same vendor more standardized.
In addition, there have been a few notable examples of multi-vendor solutions, particularly between radios, antennas and other elements of the RAN. Samsung Networks, for example, has worked with multiple carriers around the world in applications that match their radios with other vendors’ RAN equipment as well as deployments that use other vendors’ radios with Samsung’s vRAN software. Because Samsung recently enhanced their 64T64R massive MIMO radios with the ability to support up to 200MHz of spectrum across three cells, this becomes a compelling option for some operators. Plus, it’s yet another example of how an increasing array of vendor and solution choices are starting to impact the market.
While some industry watchers have recently voiced frustration that 5G network evolution seems to be stalling—and some of those observations are hard to argue with—it’s also important to remember that progress in certain elements of 5G networks, notably the RAN, are being made. Not all of them may be easily apparent and the speed at which they’re occurring may be slower than some would like, but behind the scenes, the critical elements needed to bring about more advanced 5G applications are definitely being put into place.
Bob O’Donnell is the president and chief analyst of TECHnalysis Research, LLC a market research firm that provides strategic consulting and market research services to the technology industry and professional financial community. You can follow him on LinkedIn at Bob O’Donnell or on Twitter @bobodtech.