Telco equipment vendor Nokia, has partnered with Google Cloud to develop new, cloud-based 5G radio solutions. The two companies will collaborate on joint solutions combining Nokia’s Radio Access Network (RAN), Open RAN, Cloud RAN (vRAN) and Edge cloud technologies, with Google’s Edge Computing platform and applications ecosystem. The collaboration will lead to the development of solutions and use cases to solve key 5G scenarios for businesses worldwide.
The initial collaboration, which is already underway at Nokia’s Espoo headquarters, will pursue a number of different workstreams. The first, which will focus on Cloud RAN, will integrate Nokia’s 5G virtualised distributed unit (vDU) and 5G virtualised centralised unit (vCU) with Google’s Edge Computing platform, running on Anthos. Nokia’s 5G standalone network with vCU and 5G core will also be tested on Google Cloud Anthos platform as a cloud-native deployment.
Global CSPs can unlock new monetisation opportunities by driving 5G connectivity and advanced services to enterprise customers at the network edge, to deliver new, digital experiences for consumers. By leveraging its Open RAN and Cloud RAN leadership and combining it with best-in-class public cloud infrastructure from Google Cloud, Nokia is expanding its ecosystem of partners and helping CSPs lower deployment and operational costs, which is essential for monetising 5G deployments.
George Nazi, Global VP, Telco, Media and Entertainment Industry Solutions, Google Cloud, said: “In the 5G era, we are committed to delivering solutions underpinned by world-class engineering that support our customers’ requirements and help them to take advantage of 5G.”
Bikash Koley, VP, Google Global Network and Head of Technology, Telecom Products, Google Cloud, said: “This partnership with Nokia will combine both of our decades of mobile communications expertise to deliver new solutions that help CSPs enable business transformation at the network edge.”
Both Nokia and Google Cloud will continue to develop the scope of these initial collaborations by exploring new technologies and solutions that will enhance their joint 5G Cloud RAN and edge cloud solutions.
Tommi Uitto, President, Mobile Networks, Nokia, said: “We are excited to develop new 5G solutions at the network edge with Google Cloud. Our service provider customers will benefit greatly from this collaboration with more choice and flexibility to efficiently deploy and orchestrate 5G networks. This will ultimately help our customers deliver 5G services on the network edge providing multiple options of cloud-based solutions paving the way forward.”
Alex Choi, SVP, Strategy and Technology Innovation, Deutsche Telekom, added that: “Deutsche Telekom is on a journey to transform to a new open, disaggregated and cloud-native infrastructure with an automated production model. We are therefore excited to see two innovative organisations like Nokia and Google Cloud joining forces to accelerate ecosystem innovation across critical areas like Open RAN and virtual RAN and the cloud-native 5G Core.”
Ibrahim Gedeon, CTO, TELUS, said: “As we accelerate our Digital Transformation journey, we’re pleased to see two leaders coming together who are committed to innovation in 5G. These new Edge and convergence solutions coming out of the collaboration between Nokia and Google Cloud will help TELUS fuel a fundamental shift to digital across communications, healthcare, agriculture, and many other sectors-redefining how service is delivered in Canada and around the world.”
