Nokia used its traditional Sunday press conference at Mobile World Conference to launch a new anyRAN CloudRAN strategy. It also hinted at upcoming RIC announcements, but said that Open RAN interface specifications are still not mature enough to truly open up CloudRAN.
CloudRAN – how Open, and how to support any RAN?
As debate rages about how “incumbent” vendors should engage in Open RAN, one thing is not in doubt, Open or not, they are turning up the dial to enable cloudRAN.
Two years after announcing RAN development partnerships with public cloud players, Nokia has announced that its RAN software can now be deployed on any any partner’s cloud and server infrastructure, in addition to Nokia AirScale base stations and Nokia AirFrame edge servers.
AnyRAN is proof, it said, that its commitment to enabling CloudRAN is real and runs deep. However, anyRAN is not an Open approach that completely disaggregates Nokia software to run on any combination of hardware. Instead, Nokia says it is able to deploy in any RAN because of the way it has developed its Cloud RAN SmartNIC. This is a Layer 1 (fronthaul) In-Line acceleration card using dedicated silicon that can integrate “with all leading Cloud or server infrastructures.”
Nokia does that by inserting its RAN NIC card with ReefShark SoC as standard PCI card inside a server in the data centre, you will get Nokia’s L1 acceleration plus the software stack
This L1 card can be integrated in Nokia’s own AirFrame OpenEdge range, or in any hardware partner servers, or in any hyperscaler services, Nokia said. Those partner reveals will be made tomorrow when Nokia cuts the ribbon on its MWC stand, and will also be present on partner stands.
When the customer goes with Nokia Cloud RAN they will get also feature parity and all those same performance and functionality characteristics what we have on a classic site – and that is unique in the marketplace
Explaining the approach at a briefing prior to MWC, Pasi Toivanen, SVP & BU Head, Partner Cloud RAN Solutions, Nokia, said, “We want to deliver the strong message that when our customers are with Nokia there is true flexibility. If they want to go with with certain server makers, we are there with well defined and well-productised solutions. If they wanted hyperscale options we are there as well. If they wantto have the so-called Nokia blueprint we are there. So, this is the true flexibility for the market for the customers both on the CSP side and enterprise side. And we call it anyRAN.”
“When the customer goes with Nokia Cloud RAN they will get also feature parity and all those same performance and functionality characteristics what we have on a classic site – and that is unique in the marketplace. Others have very good alternatives but they do not have the same richness of features.”
Toivanen said that he has received specific quotes from hyperscalers that they have achieved the highest performance with Nokia. They are not public yet but it gives Nokia confidence that it has the architecture correct, he said.
customers are curious to understand what they could do with CloudRAN, how they are able to make their network evolution strategy more successful, what new business objectives they can accommodate by having CloudRAN as part of the network
In terms of operator demand, Nokia said that its bet is that it will start to see demand from urban areas where there are higher traffic demands and more need for flexibility to support user and control plane processing. Added to that is the fact that any deployment needs a high penetration of fibre. Greenfield operators can also be a good target.
Toivanen said that interest in CloudRAN is geographically spread across Europe, the Middle East and in AsiaPac, but it is also opening up strategic discussions about business value.
“The key word is interest. I think customers are curious to understand what they could do with CloudRAN, how they are able to make their network evolution strategy more successful, what new business objectives they can accommodate by having CloudRAN as part of the network. And I think from our point of view, it’s giving us the perfect position to have a truly strategic discussion with the customer. How they see their future – evovling mobile broadband or expanding towards the enterprise where they could ncapture more value. And that is driving the dialogue with the customer, meeting the true logic of the strategy.”
Nokia’s CloudRAN SmartNIC for L1 acceleration drives its AnyRAN CLoudRAN strategy
Operational issues still to be worked out
The issue with integrating with any cloud at a software level is that the software provider has to model deployment, management, orchestration and updates of that software for a host of environments. So how will the anyRAN strategy overcome that hurdle? It sounds like something that is yet to be fully worked out.
with the hyper scalers the lifecycle management discussion is now at a very active phase
“That is actually a very interesting challenge that we are still working on with the partners,” Toivanen said. “The expectation is that it is Nokia who is responsible for tier one and tier two, because we have the highest degree of the automation. But for example with the hyper scalers the lifecycle management discussion is now at a very active phase. We are finalising how we are able to really secure the synchronisation and related Lifecycle Management automation – when AWS for examaple is updating their stack and we are putting in the new version of our radio software. That is a fantastic challenge for CI/CD and how we are able to automate that to the maximum degree yet, of course, securing the quality as well.”
Going open – the billion dollar question
Toivanen also showed another sign that vendor Cloud RAN strategies do not need to move in lockstep with Open RAN specifications, especially around the interfaces between radio processing layers.
The O-RAN Alliance is developing the Acceleration Abstraction Layer (AAL) that defines hardware accelerator interface functions and protocols for the O-RAN AAL interface, including configuration and management functions, procedures and operations. That includes interfacing to such critical functions as Forward Error Correction and hiPHY protocols for Massive MIMO beamf forming.
It’s not the place where you go and tear it apart and throw all the balls in the air
“We are very aware that market is overheated when it comes to the disaggregation of Cloud RAN and also O-RAN. And we want to bring clarity as to what Nokia does there. We are actvely contributing and following what happens in O-RAN. At the same time we want to be aware that no one should be oversimplifying the landscape – especially when we are talking about that L1/L2 interface where we are sharing real time some of the most demanding algorithms on the planet.”
“It’s not the place where you go and tear it apart and throw all the balls in the air and reach for the best. It requires laser focus specification to open that interface. And when it is there, we will be there as well, and actually, meanwhile we will support creating that high quality specification.”
Asked when he expected the O-RAN specifications to be ready, he said that was the “billion dollar question”. He added, “Honestly the AAL interface is not mature enough. Is it happening this year? I think probably not. Next year? Perhaps”
Nokia co-chairs O-RAN Alliance’s Workgroup 6 (The Cloudification and Orchestration Work Group) and Workgroup 4 (The Open Fronthaul Interfaces Work Group)
Keep eyes peeled on the Nokia RIC
Although he expressed reservation about the complexity of developing that specification, Toivanen did say that the development of the O-RAN RIC is coming along very strongly.
“There our experiences with the customers are very exciting and we are going to continue announcing more about those.”
Nokia has achieved partner integrations on its near real time RIC, Toivanen said, but those announcements and partners are for another day.
