Vodafone has become a founder member of the Open RAN Policy Coalition.
Open RAN Policy Coalition promotes policies to advance the adoption of open and interoperable solutions in the Radio Access Network (RAN) as a means to create innovation, spur competition and expand the supply chain for mobile technologies including 5G.
Vodafone has been a leading advocate for open RAN approaches as part of the industry association, the Telecom Infra Project (TIP), which it now Chairs. While open RAN is still a maturing technology, where there is still a need to catch up with existing vendors from the point of view of performance, cost and industrialisation, Vodafone is actively trialling open RAN technology in the UK, Ireland, Turkey, Mozambique and the Democratic Republic of Congo.
The Open RAN Policy Coalition founding members include: Airspan; Altiostar; AT&T; AWS; Cisco; CommScope; Dell; DISH Network; Facebook; Fujitsu; Google; IBM; Juniper Networks; Mavenir; Microsoft; NEC; NewEdge Signal Solutions; NTT; Oracle; Parallel Wireless; Qualcomm; Rakuten; Samsung Electronics America; Telefónica; US Ignite; Verizon; VMWare; Vodafone; World Wide Technology; and XCOM-Labs.
Johan Wibergh, CTO, Vodafone Group
Vodafone is focused on expanding our supply chain options through engaging with open RAN vendors and encouraging newer network providers, to ensure the optimal balance across suppliers.
Joakim Reiter, External Affairs Director, Vodafone Group
We encourage authorities – not least in Europe – to include open RAN deployments as part of their future industrial strategies and provide support for R&D, piloting and deployment of open RAN as well as to start-ups in radio software.
