Telco and IT vendors pursue AI integrated cloud native solutions, while Nokia sells point products
The move to AI and cloud native is accelerating amongst network equipment and IT vendors which have announced highly integrated smart cloud solutions designed to migrate their telco customers into a new and profitable cloud future. The Cloud Native Computing Foundation (CNCF), as the name suggests, is a vendor-neutral consortium dedicated to making cloud native ubiquitous. The group defines cloud native as a collection of “technologies [that] empower organizations to build and run scalable applications in modern, dynamic environments such as public, private and hybrid clouds. Containers, service meshes, microservices, immutable infrastructure and declarative APIs exemplify this approach.”
CNCF writes that the cloud native approach “enable[s] loosely coupled systems that are resilient, manageable and observable. Combined with robust automation, they allow engineers to make high-impact changes frequently and predictably with minimal toll.”
In particular, Ericsson, HPE/Juniper, Cisco, Huawei, ZTE, IBM, and Dell have all announced telco end to end solutions that provide a platform for new services and applications by integrating AI, automation, orchestration and APIs over cloud-native based infrastructure. Let’s look at each of those capabilities:
- AI (Artificial Intelligence): Leveraging AI capabilities allows telcos to automate processes, optimize network performance, and enhance customer experiences. By analyzing vast amounts of data, AI-driven insights enable better decision-making and predictive maintenance.
- Automation: Automation streamlines operations, reduces manual intervention, and accelerates service delivery. Whether it’s provisioning new network resources, managing security protocols, or handling routine tasks, automation plays a pivotal role in modern telco infrastructure.
- Orchestration: Orchestration refers to coordinating and managing various network functions and services. It ensures seamless interactions between different components, such as virtualized network functions (VNFs) and physical infrastructure. By orchestrating these elements, telcos achieve agility and flexibility.
- APIs (Application Programming Interfaces): APIs facilitate communication between different software components. In the telco context, APIs enable interoperability, allowing third-party applications to interact with telco services. This openness encourages innovation and the development of new applications.
- Cloud-Native Infrastructure: Moving away from traditional monolithic architectures, cloud-native infrastructure embraces microservices, containerization, and scalability. Telcos are adopting cloud-native principles to build resilient, efficient, and adaptable networks.
While each company has its unique approach, the overarching goal is to empower telcos to deliver cutting-edge services, enhance network performance, and stay competitive in an ever-evolving industry. These advancements pave the way for exciting possibilities in the telecommunications landscape. When fully integrated, these technologies will enable the creation of smart cloud networks that can run themselves without human involvement and do so less expensively — but also more efficiently, responsively and securely than anything that exists today.
Our esteemed UK colleague Stephen M Saunders, MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire– more below) notes that Nokia is not embracing smart cloud telco solutions, but is instead focusing on individual products. Last October, the company announced strategic and operational changes to its business model and divided the company into four business units. At that time, Nokia’s President and CEO Pekka Lundmark said:
“We continue to believe in the mid to long term attractiveness of our markets. Cloud Computing and AI revolutions will not materialize without significant investments in networks that have vastly improved capabilities. However, while the timing of the market recovery is uncertain, we are not standing still but taking decisive action on three levels: strategic, operational and cost. First, we are accelerating our strategy execution by giving business groups more operational autonomy. Second, we are streamlining our operating model by embedding sales teams into the business groups and third, we are resetting our cost-base to protect profitability. I believe these actions will make us stronger and deliver significant value for our shareholders.”
Steve says Nokia’s new divide-and-conquer strategy is being reinforced at its sales meetings, according to an attendee at one such gathering this year, with sales reps being urged to laser-focus on selling point products.
“The telco capex situation at the moment means Nokia — and others — have no choice but to examine every aspect of their business to work out how to adjust for a future CSP market that is itself going through dramatic change,” said Jeremiah Caron, global head of research and analysis at market research firm GlobalData Technology.
Most telcos are increasingly adopting cloud-native technologies to meet the demands of 5G SA core networks and to better automate their services.. However, some telcos are hesitant to fully embrace cloud-native due to concerns about complexity, cost, and reliability. Other challenges of cloud native are: changing the software development life cycle, privacy and security, guaranteeing end to end latency, and cloud vendor lock-in due to a lack of standards (every cloud vendor has their own proprietary APIs and network access configurations.
References:
https://www.silverliningsinfo.com/multi-cloud/report-smart-cloud-and-coming-paradigm-shift
https://www.fiercewireless.com/5g/op-ed-whither-nokia
Building and Operating a Cloud Native 5G SA Core Network
Omdia and Ericsson on telco transitioning to cloud native network functions (CNFs) and 5G SA core networks
https://www.ericsson.com/en/ran/intelligent-ran-automation/intelligent-automation-platform
https://www.huaweicloud.com/intl/en-us/solution/telecom/cloud-native-development-platform.html
https://sdnfv.zte.com.cn/en/solutions/VNF/5G-core-network/cloud-native
https://www.ibm.com/products/cloud-pak-for-network-automation
https://www.dell.com/en-us/dt/industry/telecom/index.htm#tab0=0
Steve Saunders (a.k.a. Silverlinings‘ Sky Captain), is a British-born communications analyst, investor, and digital media entrepreneur. In 2018 he was awarded an MBE in the Queen’s Birthday Honours List for services to the telecommunications industry and business.
Wireless and fixed-network equipment maker Nokia on Thursday reported a smaller-than-expected profit and a double-digit fall in sales in the first quarter due to a market weakened by a lack of clients investing in 5G technology. The Espoo, Finland-based company reported a net profit of 501 million euros ($535 million) for the January-March period, up 46% from 342 million euros a year earlier. The figure was still lower than analysts had expected. One-off gains from Nokia’s licensing business contributed to the profit.
https://www.centralillinoisproud.com/news/business/ap-nokia-sees-double-digit-fall-in-january-march-sales-as-weak-market-for-5g-technology-prevails/
Iain Morris, Light Reading:
This global RAN market dominated by Ericsson, Huawei and Nokia looks increasingly dysfunctional, too. Deemed a security threat by western governments, China’s Huawei can no longer sell 5G products in the UK and other European countries, and it has long been seen as a public enemy by US authorities. In a tit for tat, China has squeezed Ericsson and Nokia to the fringes. And outside China, Nokia looks in desperate shape.
Big US contracts have instead gone to Ericsson and South Korea’s Samsung, a RAN challenger, and other customers have not picked up the slack. What was a lightning-fast rollout of 5G in India last year has now shifted down several gears. While sales at Ericsson have also dwindled, Nokia’s fell dramatically for the recent first quarter. Having recorded an operating profit for 12 consecutive quarters, its mobile networks business group this year slumped to its first-ever loss.
It’s unsettling for telcos such as Vodafone UK, which have had few other choices. “What is the state of Nokia? Not great, from what I read. It’s worrying,” said Andrea Dona, the operator’s chief network officer. “So we need to inject diversity in the network. We need another option. Samsung could be it.”
The South Korean vendor has come to figure prominently in Vodafone UK’s network strategy. Under government orders, Vodafone is stripping out Huawei equipment and software installed at 2,500 RAN sites, a job it must finish by the end of 2027. Using a system called open RAN, it has been replacing those with a mix of vendors. But Samsung is the key. It is not only down to supply many of the radio units (RUs) but also the sole provider of RAN software.
After spending about two years on technology trials at a “golden cluster” of around 20 sites in Devon, a county in southwest England, Vodafone kicked off its commercial deployment last August. Vodafone is not sharing current site numbers, but Dona insists it has now gone significantly beyond that original golden cluster. It has also ticked off some important milestones.
The most recent was the critical pairing of Samsung’s software with RUs supplied by Japan’s NEC. The original goal of open RAN was to find an alternative to CPRI, a fronthaul interface that has required operators to buy software and RUs from the same vendor’s system. With an open fronthaul interface, they would supposedly be able to combine software from one vendor with RUs from another. Yet this remains tricky.
The big problem is an advanced 5G technology called massive MIMO, which crams dozens of transmitters and receivers into antenna units. “Open interfaces does not equal multivendor,” said Ericsson in a guide to massive MIMO published in February. It notes four “fundamental challenges.”
First, new interfaces do not minimize the cost and effort of systems integration, the work a vendor would normally do before bringing a fully integrated product to market. Different vendors also need to coordinate on software releases to maintain interoperability, said Ericsson. Support for technology features is dictated by a “minimum common denominator,” it added, “resulting in performance limitations.” Finally, in the event of problems, identifying the vendor at fault, and therefore responsible for providing a fix, can be difficult.
Much of this seems to echo comments made by Tommi Uitto, the head of Nokia’s mobile business, at Mobile World Congress (MWC). Massive MIMO relies on complex algorithms in both the RU and distributed unit (DU), a server box hosting RAN software, and these need to match, he told Light Reading.
“If I have to connect my DU to someone else’s massive MIMO RU, he will have to make changes to his software, I will have to make changes to my software, or both will,” he said. Falling back on simpler algorithms could make integration easier, but these could also reduce throughput by up to 80%, according to Uitto.
In February, nevertheless, Vodafone showed off its first open RAN site where a massive MIMO NEC radio, featuring 64 transmitters and receivers, was linked to a Samsung DU. “You need to choose your partners and be very specific to your partners about the role they have and the rules of engagement,” said Dona, when asked how it was accomplished.
He insists, too, that performance is not worse than Vodafone would get from a single-vendor product. “There are difficulties to overcome, obviously, but I am not going to compromise, and we’ve worked very hard to ensure parity on the KPIs [key performance indicators],” he said. “I am not going to introduce something that doesn’t perform to at least the same level, if not better.”
Unlike several years ago, when Nokia was hurt by 5G product problems, its current malaise largely reflects the market downturn. Outside China and the US, Nokia’s RAN market share has recently grown, according to independent analysts. It has won plaudits from other commentators on open RAN. AT&T’s decision to replace Nokia across one third of sites with Ericsson, already the supplier to the other two thirds, seems mainly about having a single technology platform and the efficiencies this could bring.
Nevertheless, Nokia’s technology approach does not align with Vodafone UK’s. The open RAN the telco is building will also be entirely virtualized, using technologies that derive from the IT world. This means running the Samsung software on Intel chips in Dell servers and relying on Wind River as the cloud platform. Nokia is unopposed to much of this, but it prefers to keep its Layer 1 software – a resource-hungry part of the RAN – on custom silicon from Marvell Technology. Smart network interface cards (SmartNICs) hosting these Marvell chips can slot directly into servers.
Nokia does not, accordingly, have Layer 1 code that works with Intel’s chips. It has recently taken issue with the marketing of these as “general purpose” central processing units (CPUs), arguing that new Intel generations like Granite Rapids-D feature plenty of customization and embed that in a server. “It’s not a general-purpose processor,” said Uitto at MWC. “And if you build servers with only those CPUs, it would be ridiculous because you’d have all this overhead of hardware acceleration in the product cost and power consumption.”
The Finnish vendor’s earlier criticisms focused on the shortcomings of using general-purpose silicon for Layer 1 functions. Even Ericsson, which uses Intel chips in its virtual RAN products, says custom silicon will remain ahead for some key performance measures. In comments emailed to Light Reading earlier this year, Michael Begley, the head of Ericsson’s RAN compute product line, said that “purpose-built hardware will continue to be the most energy-efficient and compact hardware for radio site deployments going forward.”
But Dona says Vodafone has not seen any drawbacks. “We wouldn’t have gone to mass deployment if we hadn’t met the minimum criteria, but it took a while,” he said, noting that it has been nearly three years since Vodafone UK first announced its open RAN partners.
Vodafone has now taken what Dona calls the same “blueprint” into parts of Romania, where it also needs to replace Huawei under government orders (there is a huge amount of Huawei across Vodafone’s European footprint). And there is a strong hint from Dona that this Samsung-based template will play an even bigger role in future. Margherita Della Valle, Vodafone’s CEO, confirmed on a recent earnings call that suppliers have been invited to pitch for future work across Vodafone’s entire European and African footprint of about 170,000 sites.
The danger for Nokia could be the perception it is in financial trouble and that the market needs alternatives. This gave impetus to the open RAN movement several years ago, when operators were unimpressed by Nokia’s initial 5G products. If decision makers at other telcos share Dona’s view about the “state” of Nokia, and are convinced they must introduce new suppliers, Nokia’s condition may only worsen.
But if it were perilously weakened, operators would simply be substituting one vendor for another, not boosting choice. The consolidation that happened years ago showed that a global RAN market supporting low-cost mobile usage at scale was not big enough for more than a handful of vendors. Last year, it shrank 11%, according to Omdia (a Light Reading sister company).
Omdia forecasts another decline this year of between 4% and 6%. Nokia’s mobile business, meanwhile, has just suffered a first-quarter operating loss of €42 million (US$45 million), after sales dropped 39% year-over-year, to less than €1.6 billion ($1.7 billion). It worryingly suggests there is not enough pie to keep even a few vendors well nourished.
https://www.lightreading.com/open-ran/nokia-plight-shows-need-for-samsung