Disaggregation, Open RAN and 6G

At the Brooklyn 6G Summit (B6GS), Peter Jarich, Head of GSMA Intelligence, tackled the difficult and controversial topic of Open RAN in a 6G context, looking at the goal of 6G and what do Operators mean when they talk about Open RAN.

The first topic that the talk covered is what do operators want from the future networks. The top three priorities, as can be seen in the chart above are, Security, Low-cost network and Openness. 

The good news is that majority of the operators think that 5G will be the catalyst to turn their networks into a much more open one. The main source of worry for the operators is the Integration challenges. This topic has been explained in detail on a blog post by Open RAN specialist, Parallel Wireless, here.

The talk nicely concludes by explaining that while Open RAN may play a big part in the future, it is much more than just open interfaces that the operators are looking for. 

The video is embedded below, courtesy of IEEE TV.

We can conclude with the Tweet below where analyst Ed Gubbins is pointing out that BT Chief Architect Neil McRae said, "The golden years for Open RAN is probably when we hit 6G." Another analyst, Daryl Schoolar agrees with this sentiment. Would love to hear your thoughts.

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