Vodafone and Mavenir have completed the first data and Voice over LTE (VoLTE) call across a containerised 4G small cell Open RAN solution in a lab environment.
Wind River provided its Containers as a Service (CaaS) software, part of Wind River Studio.
The companies described the demonstration of a containerised solution as a major milestone in the evolution of connectivity equipment away from physical infrastructure to a digital cloud-based environment.
Having first started work on a containerised indoor enterprise connectivity solution in January 2021, Vodafone has completed tests for an important stage of the technology roadmap. The plug-and-play small cell equipment can ensure comprehensive mobile coverage in every corner of the office. The solution will provide 4G coverage initially, making use of radio hardware from Sercomm and software from Mavenir (Open RAN).
Andrea Dona, Chief Network Officer, Vodafone UK, said; “Open RAN is opening doors to simplified and intuitive connectivity solutions. For our wider network deployment strategy, Open RAN is enabling us to work with a wider pool of suppliers and to avoid vendor lock-in scenarios that might prevent us from taking advantage of the latest innovations. The same could be said for enterprise connectivity solutions.
Stefano Cantarelli, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer, Mavenir, said; “Cloud Native and Open Solutions are becoming the new reality of the mobile world, and these include Radio Access and its containerised implementation. Open vRAN is a very flexible architecture that can serve any type of segment and Mavenir is really pleased to work with Vodafone in the enterprise business and achieved another first together. It is an opportunity to show that automated and AI controlled systems will simplify life to business and industry.”
Vodafone outlines its O-RAN architecture and vendors
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