INTERVIEW: BT Groupās network and security chief Howard Watson predicted deployment of open RAN in urban environments is still at least four years away from becoming a reality, as he highlighted broader moves by operators to evolve their infrastructure.
During an interview at MWC23 last week, Watson told Mobile World LiveBTās focus is currently on the RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC), one of several elements forming part of the broader open movement.
But he predicted the pay-off from internal and collaborative open RAN development in urban environments would only begin to take off in 2027 or 2028 ārather than 2025, 2026ā.
BT was not part of a major European operator initiative launched in 2021 to advance open RAN, but Watson noted it works with industry groups including the Telecom Infra Project on what he believes are the three key opportunities presented by the approach.
āThereās disaggregation, how do you layer your network, build APIs between themā.
āThereās virtualisation or cloudificationā and āthen thereās diversification, how do we get more vendors into the mixā.
Watson explained BTās current open RAN focus is on how to employ the RIC to āget real smart networking capabilityā.
The executive also discussed BTās work to embed security into its 5G and fibre networks, which he noted are āincreasingly more and more criticalā to its customers lives.
Click here toĀ view the full interview, which includes updates on BTās 5G deployment, potential uses of satellite connectivity and its ongoing efforts to reduce power consumption.
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