Vodafone UK has selected Samsung as Open RAN vendor to bring virtualized RAN (vRAN), as well as its latest 4G and 5G solutions, including its Massive MIMO and other radios, announced Samsung on Monday.
Samsung will supply its commercial vRAN solutions and O-RAN compliant radios, covering both low-band and mid-band spectrum. The company’s fully virtualized RAN is software-based and runs on commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) servers, offering features and performance that are equivalent to traditional hardware-based equipment. Using a cloud-native and container-based architecture, Samsung’s vRAN enables more flexible deployments and efficiency in network management for mobile operators.
Among the key benefits of the revolutionary architecture is its automation capabilities, which simplify end-to-end network management. With Samsung’s vRAN, operators can quickly meet the evolving demands of new and existing services with minimal impact on deployment. Samsung will also deliver to Vodafone UK its market leading O-RAN compliant 5G radios, including the latest Massive MIMO radios.
This collaboration with Vodafone marks a first for Samsung, as the company brings its cloud native virtualized RAN technology to a leading operator’s network in Europe. As acknowledged by many in the industry, virtualized RAN and O-RAN technologies will be important to helping evolve network architectures to power the next generation of 5G applications and services.
Johan Wibergh, Chief Technology Officer, Vodafone
Vodafone is committed to leading the next wave of digital transformation across Europe, ensuring fast and reliable connectivity for all. Open RAN, built on strong partnerships, is key to realizing this ambition.
Paul Kyungwhoon Cheun, President and Head of Networks Business at Samsung Electronics
We are proud that this collaboration with Vodafone—one of the premier carriers in the world—will be the first scaled deployment of our pioneering 5G technologies in Europe, including vRAN and O-RAN.
