Nokia has announced the successful completion of a commercial Cloud RAN deployment with the Finnish telco and digital service provider, Elisa, in Finland. In essence, Elisa is now able to deploy Nokia’s commercial Cloud RAN solution which can co-exist with purpose-built networks in hybrid environments and evolve into full Cloud-native networks.
Common Nokia RAN software ensures feature and performance consistency of Cloud RAN and purpose-built RAN across the entire commercial footprint. Both companies previously completed Europe’s first Cloud RAN trial in October 2023.
The commercial deployment completed end-to-end 5G voice and data calls with Nokia’s 5G Cloud RAN solution which included its AirScale Massive MIMO radios, baseband software, and AI-powered MantaRay network management solution.
Nokia’s high-performance, energy-efficient Cloud RAN architecture integrates with all Cloud or server infrastructures. Elisa utilised Dell XR8620 servers as well as Red Hat OpenShift, a hybrid Cloud application platform powered by Kubernetes, to support Cloud-native RAN functions across the network. By integrating with Red Hat OpenShift, service providers have the option to scale their 5G network footprint and quickly introduce new services. The deployment verified areas such as capacity, performance, features, life cycle management, automation, and energy management.
Elisa is currently pursuing network cloudification and extending this transformation from the network core towards the access network. Cloudification plays a key role in the scalability of network services and allows the operator to meet customers’ changing needs. With Cloud RAN Elisa is able to shift the network computing power closer to the customers, whose network usage is transforming closer to the network Edge. AI-powered applications are expected to accelerate the demand for Edge computing in the future.
A benefit of the early adoption of Cloud RAN is trialling the new Cloud-native production model, which differs significantly from earlier models, involves a whole new ecosystem. Deploying the first commercial 5G Cloud network in Europe positions Elisa strongly while moving towards the 6G era – which is predicted to be increasingly Cloud-native. Additionally, cloudification plays a key role in Elisa’s journey towards self-driving and self-healing autonomous networks.
Nokia is supporting its global customers get their Cloud RAN networks up and running much faster, removing complexity, and ensuring openness and flexibility. Nokia has already completed numerous end-to-end 5G data calls in multi-supplier setups with hardware and software from its best-in-class ecosystem of leading industry partners. It is further evidence of Nokia’s flexible anyRAN approach that provides the best choice of strategic options for communications service providers and enterprises for their RAN evolution with purpose-built, hybrid, or Cloud RAN solutions, enabling customers to monetize their networks.
“This successful Cloud RAN deployment with Nokia is another important step on our cloudification which started with cloudifying the network core and edge, and now includes the radio access network. We continue to pioneer new technologies in our journey towards autonomous operations helping us to continue innovating and delivering best customer experience,” said Kalle Lehtinen, Chief Technology Officer, Elisa.
“This successful collaboration with Elisa confirms that our Cloud RAN solution is ready for commercial deployment. Under our anyRAN approach, we work very closely with strategic partners like Red Hat and bring together best-in-class partner solutions to offer true flexibility and scalability to operators and enterprises. For our customers, cloudification will enable new revenue models and monetisation options,” added Aji Ed, Head of Cloud RAN at Nokia.
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