The true benefits of 5G will be realized with massive scale, something that operators will have to pay mightily to achieve. In carrier-led effort to shift network economics in their favor, the open RAN ecosystem has flourished in recent years and is poised for a big breakthrough.
Major global CSPs like Telefonica and Vodafone are exploring multi-vendor RAN solutions across their network footprints. In Japan, Rakuten is set to enter the market with a new level of capital and operational efficiencies built on top of a cloud-native, open network. And geopolitical issues have prompted an examination of vendor diversity and fostering innovation through government investment.
In this report, we explore the latest developments in the open RAN world, including among organizational bodies like the O-RAN Alliance and Telecom Infra Project, as well as recap operator trials of interoperable, multi-vendor RAN.
