‘What network disaggregation will bring to telecom comes down to what operators want out of their networks,’ says Simon Burley, principal at Ofcom
Panelists at RCR Live Telco Reinvention in London offered their thoughts on how the industry is working to ensure interoperability in an Open RAN architecture, from the chipsets up. “The notion of disaggregation… [allows] the operator to be able to architect, deploy and scale the networks in a much more flexible fashion in line with their marketing vision and business outcomes,” said Simon Burley, principal at Ofcom. “I think that in itself is quite interesting, and I think it will be interesting to then see how operators deploy.”
Even with the benefits of Open RAN and network disaggregation clear, NTT Docomo’s VP, General Manager and Global Head of Open RAN Sadayuki Abeta pointed out that only a few operators have yet achieved commercial deployments, largely due to how challenging integration and interoperability is. “So, what is the actual challenge for the operators to introduce the Open RAN in commercial [deployments]? Why is [it] that the system integration, since most operators do not have the experience of a capability to do that integration by themselves? For them, that is something new to do that integration with interoperability within the different vendors,” he said, adding that NTT had a sort of leg up here as it first introduced the multi-vendor network work in the 4G era and is capable of interoperability testing.
Interoperability amid all the ‘slicing and dicing’
End-to-end interoperability between network components across vendors is key to successful Open RAN implementation, and according to Picocom Chief Solutions Architect Doug Pulley, it starts at the silicon and software levels.“It’s important… that since [silicon and software] often drive the power consumption [and] the cost of equipment, that those are optimized carefully… With… disaggregation, there’s many ways of slicing and dicing… the network, literally. In that case, you need silicon that also allows you to fit into lots of different use cases.”
And this is largely due to economics, he added, because when one type of chip fits a lot of scenarios, you can increase the volume of production, driving down the cost. Because interoperability begins at the silicon level, Pulley argued that chip vendors should be “really active” in helping to establish Open RAN standards and be involved in groups like the Small Cell Forum. “That kind of detailed involvement in how those things really work is essential to bring that interoperability to the market,” he said.
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Interoperability between products from different vendors, though, is hard to achieve, as Abeta mentioned.
To help vendors address this challenge, Ofcom and Digital Catapult developed SONIC Labs in the U.K. as a neutral space for vendors with early-stage Open RAN-compliant products to work through integration and interoperability. “It’s an opportunity for these vendors to work and collaborate to identify and address some of these integration and interoperability challenges that are likely to be encountered with Open RAN,” explained Burley.
The future of disaggregation
Looking ahead to 5G Advanced and then 6G, Pulley believes Open RAN to be “well positioned.” He said that critical future considerations like data harvesting are already “comprehended by Open RAN.” He did, however, maintain concerns around what might happen to traffic in future networks and how that will impact Open RAN development and strategy. “We’ve got a very disruptive event going on right now with generative AI,” he explained, asking what this will mean for traffic. “Does it mean nothing will happen? Does it mean it’ll have a small impact? Will it have a very big impact? Will it shift the ratio of downlink to uplink average traffic loads or by time of day? Or the usual things that might concern an operator from an operational standpoint?” he posed, arguing that we just don’t know yet.
At the end of the day, though, said Burley, what network disaggregation will bring to telecom comes down to what operators want out of their networks. “The types of services, et cetera, that they want to be able to offer to their customers [and] what sort of architecture is required then to be able to realize that,” he said. “Then you can start to understand whether [a] set menu or… [a] buffet-type model will help… deliver on those business outcomes.”