Qualcomm: What's Next in 5G

In a webcast in lieu of Mobile World Congress, Qualcomm showcased some of its R&D project for "What's Next in 5G."

Here are the highlights:

• Advanced 5G Massive MIMO OTA test network: This end-to-end system operating in 3.5 GHz highlights key innovations to further improve the network capacity and user experience benefits of multi-user massive MIMO and to enable of wide-area, low-latency services such as augmented reality.
• 5G wide-area technology evolution: To demonstrate the future of 5G wide-area networks and devices beyond 2020, this demo models the performance of new features such as full duplex MIMO and accurate device positioning technologies, and introduces new data management approaches for IOT.
• Real-world experiences over an outdoor mmWave OTA test network: A 28 GHz end-end demonstration of advanced approaches for mmWave mobility, robustness and performance under different real-life operation scenarios, bringing enhanced and new mobile experiences.
• The evolution of 5G mobile mmWave technology: Models the system performance of of new mmWave network and device features coming in Release 16+ that will simplify network densification, elevate system performance, and enhance device efficiency.
• 5G factory of the future: This live demonstration in our industrial 5G test network showcases the benefits of some of the upcoming 5G capabilities for industrial automation such as time sensitive networking (TSN) and enhanced ultra-reliable low latency communication (eURLLC).
• Precise positioning over an indoor 5G network: Demonstration of sub-meter 3D positioning for industrial IoT applications, such as asset tracking and automated guided vehicle control, by utilizing multiple 5G transmission points to measure time difference of arrival.
• 5G NR Cellular-to-Everything (C-V2X) : 3GPP Release 16 brings additional C-V2X capabilities based on 5G NR to complement C-V2X with new and advanced use cases. In this 5G NR C-V2X demonstration we show how sensor sharing using distance-based reliability can improve reaction time across challenging radio environments, both as an interactive simulation and in an over-the-air Release 16 aligned prototype.

“Our R&D work continues to provide breakthrough technologies that help drive the mobile ecosystem forward,” said John Smee, vice president, engineering, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “We are now in 2020 and it’s the beginning of the 5G era. It’s a great time for us to demonstrate the innovations we’ve been working on in our labs to set the stage for what to expect in the coming year.”

https://www.qualcomm.com/company/events/whats-next-in-5g

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Verizon picks Fujitsu or CPRI, eCPRI and Ethernet Multiplexing Fronthaul

Verizon selected Fujitsu Network Communications as a preferred supplier of CPRI, eCPRI and Ethernet multiplexing fronthaul technology.

In partnership with HFR Networks, Inc. , the Fujitsu solution works across Verizon’s existing network infrastructure to reduce deployment and operational costs while simultaneously supporting 4G LTE and 5G services.

The Time Sensitive Networking (TSN) solution provided by Fujitsu and HFR Networks facilitates a more efficient and lower cost centralized (CRAN) Hubbing of 4G/LTE CPRI traffic using standards based RoE (Radio Over Ethernet) along with eCPRI and Ethernet services.

“Fujitsu is a proven supplier of Smart xHaul transport solutions to Verizon, and we share a history of innovation and success,” said Paul Havala, head of the optical business unit at Fujitsu Network Communications. “Our open Ethernet Fronthaul solution provides Verizon with a reduced total cost of ownership and contributes to a smooth evolution to 5G.”

https://www.fujitsu.com/us/about/resources/news/press-releases/2020/fnc-20200225.html

Fujitsu expands its Smart xHaul for 5G transport

Tuesday, March 05, 2019  Fujitsu  

Fujitsu Network Communications is expanding its Smart xHaul transport solution for 5G transport networks in collaboration with HFR Networks and Volta Networks.

The solution enables 5G transport networks to leverage legacy 4G Centralized Radio Access Network (C-RAN) fiber transport and cell sites using an open, disaggregated, pay-as-you-go architecture.

The Fujitsu Smart xHaul solution consists of several key elements:

Intelligent Fronthaul -- now includes new intelligent fronthaul platforms for centralized and cloud-based RAN architectures leveraging next-generation Packet RAN access technology by HFR Networks. The M6424 Time-Sensitive Networking (TSN) aggregation and transport switch series supports interfaces for CPRI, eCPRI and Ethernet services. This temperature-hardened, one rack unit solution supports 24x multi-rate client ports at up to 25G operation for 4G, 5G and Ethernet service coexistence, along with 4x 100GbE network ports offering multiple topologies. With high-precision timing, TSN offers synchronization to the cell site remote radio, while maintaining low latency variation for aggregated 4G and 5G traffic by preempting Ethernet and Internet services. In addition, the M6424-R O-RAN compliant Fronthaul Gateway platform includes a PHY-LOW networking interface that significantly improves bandwidth efficiency and enables multi-vendor interoperability between legacy and new base station equipment.  With this solution, a 5G overlay is not needed on existing 4G transport networks, helping to reduce total costs and speed time to market of lucrative new 5G services.

Disaggregated Cloud Control Plane -- a cloud-based control plane architecture provided by Volta Networks is integral to the new Smart xHaul solution. The virtual routing engine in the cloud combined with agent software on the 1FINITY S100 Switch platform, enables service providers to realize full routing capabilities optimized to their specific application without the limitations and excessive cost structures of legacy, monolithic routers and transport elements. Disaggregating the control and user planes allow scale out via linear resource scaling versus scaling up to a limit with integrated control and user planes. As a result, the solution provides pay-as-you-go efficient scaling to address initial migration from 4G to 5G, as well as diverse 5G multiservice operation using network slicing, for greater intelligence, scalability and cost-efficiency without network overlays.

Network Slicing -- Fujitsu enables network slicing operation via its 1FINITY S100 transport switches for midhaul and backhaul transport, providing enhanced network slicing and cloud control segment routing to reduce operational complexity, increase scalability and deliver better infrastructure utilization versus traditional routers.

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Verizon hits 4.2 Gbps over 5G mmWave with 8-channel carrier aggregation

Verizon demonstrated speeds up to 4.2 Gbps over its live 5G network.

The trial, which took place using a commercial network cell site in Texas, aggregated 800 MHz of 28 GHz band spectrum using Samsung Network’s 5G NR 28 Ghz Access Unit, which has been commercially deployed by Verizon. Motorola Mobility and Qualcomm were also key technology providers.

“We’re continuing to expand our 5G Ultra Wideband network, built to enable unique and transformational experiences for our customers,” said Adam Koeppe, Senior Vice President of Technology Planning at Verizon. “We are only beginning to scratch the surface of what 5G can do, demonstrated by this latest milestone.

“We continue to innovate and introduce advanced technologies on our 5G network that will help us reach never-before seen mobile capabilities and create new and exciting use cases across the consumer and enterprise landscape. Using 5G carrier aggregation, we are able to achieve unprecedented mobile speeds and bring the massive bandwidth available with mmWave spectrum to life,” said Koeppe.

The companies said eight channel carrier aggregation using mmWave will be widely available on the 5G network in 2020.

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Qualcomm cites momentum for its 5G mmWave small cells platform

Qualcomm Technologies cited growing support for its 5G RAN platform (FSM100xx), which was first announced in May 2018 and it has since been adopted by many manufacturers and cellular infrastructure providers.

The platform support mmWave radio access for indoor and outdoor network densification.

“With the continued growth and adoption of our Qualcomm 5G RAN platform, Qualcomm Technologies aims to deliver cutting-edge 5G mmWave infrastructure technology to power 5G small cell and remote radio head infrastructure across the globe,” said Durga Malladi, senior vice president and general manager, 4G/5G, Qualcomm Technologies, Inc. “Combined with the power and flexibility to support virtual RAN and open radio access interfaces, our Qualcomm 5G RAN platform is designed to allow infrastructure providers the ability to solve pressing connectivity issues and give its users increased access to the reliable, robust and powerful mobile experiences enabled by 5G. We are pleased that leading 5G infrastructure innovators are choosing our Qualcomm 5G RAN platform for their network solutions, and we are excited by the opportunity ahead.”

Supporters include Airspan, Altiostar, Baicells, Corning, Radisys, Rakuten, Samsung, Sercomm, the Small Cell Forum, and Verizon.

Qualcomm intros 5G NR for Small Cells and Remote Radio Heads

Monday, May 21, 2018  5G, Qualcomm  

Qualcomm introduced the first 5G NR solution for small cells and remote radio head deployments. The new device (FSM100xx), which builds on Qualcomm's FSM Platform for 3G and 4G small cells, support 5G NR in both mmWave and sub-6 GHz spectrum.

Qualcomm said its 5G NR solutions allows OEMs to reuse both software and hardware designs across sub-6 and mmWave products, supporting high-bandwidth and robust coverage for mobile subscribers around the globe. Given the propagation characteristics of 5G NR’s higher frequencies (especially mmWave), solutions are needed to support delivery of uniform 5G experiences, especially indoors where most data is consumed.

The FSM100xx solution scales to address outdoor small cell performance requirements such as support for MIMO implementation and multi-gigabit throughput, as well as support indoor requirements such as compact form factor and power over Ethernet (PoE) support. It also includes a software-defined modem, designed to facilitate OEMs to readily upgrade their devices to comply with future 3GPP releases. Additionally, this 5G NR solution supports various options for interface splits between central unit (CU) and remote radio head, providing OEMs and operators with the flexibility to use a 5G radio access network architecture that best fits their needs, such as a virtualized 5G architecture that is designed to deliver scalability through the cloud or a more distributed architecture to ease fronthaul requirements.

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O-RAN Alliance and the Telecom Infra Project reach agreement

The O-RAN Alliance (O-RAN) and the Telecom Infra Project (TIP) agreed to collaborate on the development of interoperable open Radio Access Network (RAN) solutions.

The O-RAN Alliance is focused on the development of open, intelligent, virtualized and interoperable RAN specifications. The Alliance has already created 31 specifications, with 37 demonstrations of the technology at past MWC events, global plugfests, and more than 1 000 000 lines of code released in partnership with the Linux Foundation. Operators have begun to announce network implementations.

O-RAN Alliance’s mission and focus complements TIP’s mission of deploying end-to-end disaggregated telecom infrastructure in varying environments. With the liaison agreement O-RAN and TIP are now reaching a new level of collaboration for open RAN. The liaison allows for sharing information, referencing specifications and conducting joint testing and integration efforts.

"This new collaboration framework between O-RAN and TIP, two major initiatives in the area of open networking, will support our mission to re-shape the RAN industry towards open and intelligent mobile network infrastructure," said Alex Jinsung Choi, COO of the O-RAN Alliance and SVP Strategy & Technology Innovation, Deutsche Telekom. "Alignment on O-RAN interoperability efforts will help the industry to speed up the delivery of commercial open RAN solutions. The establishment of the first joint O-RAN Open Test and Integration Center (OTIC) with the TIP Community Lab in Berlin is a concrete step to facilitate this multi-community approach."

"TIP’s OpenRAN solutions are an important element of our work to accelerate innovation across all elements of the network including Access, Transport, Core & Services. Across the TIP community, we are seeing increasing demand and have achieved meaningful progress with OpenRAN deployments around the world," said Attilio Zani, Executive Director, Telecom Infra Project. "With this collaboration framework in place, TIP and O-RAN will work together to develop interoperable 5G RAN solutions. One of our first outputs will be the release of the OpenRAN 5GNR NR Base Station Platform requirements document with normative references to the O-RAN specifications."

http://www.o-ran.org

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Rakuten Mobile looks to Nokia to automate operations

Rakuten Mobile, Japan’s newest mobile network operator, has selected Nokia to implement a fully automated operations environment for the 5G era. Nokia will operate Rakuten Mobile’s virtualized core network to manage total cost of ownership (TCO). The agreement will allow Rakuten Mobile to focus on developing its portfolio of disruptive services and expanding its service footprint, while developing operational maturity and automation capabilities.

Nokia said it is enabling groundbreaking levels of automation in network and service lifecycle management within the Rakuten Mobile cloud environment. Specifically, Nokia is supporting over 160 virtual network function instances across two data centers in an industry-leading multivendor cloud environment. As an essential part of Rakuten Mobile’s operations organization, Nokia’s domain expertise and value-add will be incorporated into the core of Rakuten’s business.

Friedrich Trawöger, Head of Operate & Managed Services Unit at Nokia, said: “By managing its telco cloud we can help Rakuten Mobile to focus on its objectives; to launch its mobile LTE network and to rapidly realize its vision as a 5G digital service provider. We support Rakuten Mobile in bringing new services to market quickly by utilizing the latest innovations in automated operations while focusing on the total cost of ownership.”

Tareq Amin, Chief Technology Officer of Rakuten Mobile, Inc., said: “With Nokia supporting the operation of our cloud native network, we can focus on service launch and expansion. Nokia is an integral partner in our network operations, and we look forward to future business opportunities that this partnership brings.”

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NTT DOCOMO picks Cisco's segment routing to optimize 5G backhaul

NTT DOCOMO has selected Cisco's Network Convergence System routers and segment routing for network slicing to help optimize its 5G mobile backhaul.

Cisco said its converged SDN transport, with segment routing, and Network Convergence System routers can provide massive scale, full programmability, simpler cloud integration and service level agreements.

“The IP network plays a more important role with 5G than ever before,” said Jonathan Davidson, Senior Vice President and General Manager, Cisco Service Provider Business. “Networks have to be automated, programmable and capable of massive scale. Together, DOCOMO and Cisco mapped out the right path for its 5G transformation with a new intelligent, software-defined network. Converging services over a common, trustworthy architecture will reduce costs, deliver new services that span multiple domains, and prepare them for a profitable 5G future.”

, Subsea  

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Ciena pulls out of OFC 2020

Citing concerns about the COVID-19 coronavirus, Ciena has withdrawn from the upcoming Capacity Middle East 2020 event, scheduled to take place March 2-5 in Dubai, and the upcoming OFC 2020 event, scheduled to take place March 9-11 in San Diego.

“We have made the decision to cancel our participation in all industry events for the next 30 days in order to safeguard the well-being of our employees, customers and partners. Although we are disappointed that we cannot continue with these events as planned, as they are important benchmarks for the industry, we believe this is the right decision under the circumstances and we look forward to participating in future events,” stated Gary Smith, president & chief executive officer, Ciena.

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Lumentum withdraws from OFC

Lumentum confirmed that it will not attend the upcoming OFC 2020 conference and tradeshow scheduled for March 8-12 in San Diego due to the continuing spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus globally. This withdrawal includes all investor and industry events scheduled during OFC.

"Every year, we look forward to attending OFC to showcase our latest innovations and advancements in technology," said Alan Lowe, Lumentum President and CEO. "However, our highest priority is the health and safety of our employees, customers, and partners. This year, due to the rapidly evolving coronavirus outbreak, we believe we can better serve all of our stakeholders by exercising an abundance of caution and not attending OFC."

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Infinera posts Q4 revenue of $384.6 million

Infinera reported GAAP revenue for Q4 2019 of $384.6 million compared to $325.3 million in the third quarter of 2019 and $332.1 million in the fourth quarter of 2018. GAAP gross margin for the quarter was 29.0% compared to 26.7% in the third quarter of 2019 and 25.4% in the fourth quarter of 2018.  GAAP net loss for the quarter was $(66.6) million, or $(0.37) per share.  Non-GAAP net income for the quarter was $6.4 million, or $0.03 per diluted share.

“In the fourth quarter, we delivered solid results and achieved significant bookings growth. We also completed the most challenging integration tasks, doubled our synergy savings commitments for the year and returned to non-GAAP operating profitability in the fourth quarter of 2019,” said Tom Fallon, Infinera CEO. “Major accomplishments this past year included strengthening our global customer base with 10 Tier 1 scale customer wins, significant growth in backlog, and continued progress in building our innovation pipeline as evidenced by announced DRX wins, the introduction of XR optics, and growing confidence in our plan to deliver 800G products to the market in 2020.”

https://www.infinera.com/press-release/Infinera-Corporation-Reports-Fourth-Quarter-and-Fiscal-Year-2019-Financial-Results

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Crowd watch at the RSA Conference in San Francisco

2pm on Tuesday, 25-February-2020. Not bad considering the circumstances.

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