Japan’s NEC and US-based Mavenir have announced the implementation of Open RAN-based massive MIMO (mMIMO) solutions on Orange France’s 5G Standalone (SA) test network at the Orange Gardens campus in Chatillon near Paris. Mavenir’s cloud-native Open virtualised RAN (Open vRAN) software was deployed on Orange’s cloud infrastructure with NEC’s 32T32R mMIMO active antenna unit (AAU) to deliver high capacity and enhanced coverage. A press release says that interoperability between radios and virtualised Distributed Units (vDUs) over the O-RAN Alliance Open Fronthaul Interface is key to Open RAN’s ability to simplify the deployment of multi-vendor networks and eliminate vendor lock-in.
‘Deploying 5G SA mMIMO is a significant milestone in developing Open RAN and transitioning from virtualised to cloudified networks,’ said Hubert de Pesquidoux, Executive Chairman of Mavenir. Naohisa Matsuda, General Manager of NEC’s 5G Strategy and Business, added: ‘The latest deployment of Open RAN mMIMO in Europe is another milestone for Open RAN and one that required close collaboration and tight integration between multiple vendors. This synergy is exactly what Open RAN needs to successfully deliver on its promise of a truly open multi-vendor ecosystem.’
TeleGeography notes that Orange France selected Finland’s Nokia as its main 5G SA core network vendor in March 2022, with expectations of 5G SA services being offered to business users by the end of the year and a general public launch slated for 2023.
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