Network Orchestrator

AT&T and KT to work together on 5G, NFV & SDN; Consortium of 5G Carriers Forming?

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Executive Summary:

According to Business Korea, AT&T Chief Strategy Officer John Donovan met with Lee Dong-myeon, director of the KT  (Korea Telecom) Technology Convergence Center to discuss plans for the well respected telcos to share AT&T’s NFV and SDN work and KT’s efforts around 5G.  AT&T is expected to cooperate with KT in many new technologies, especially their own version of SDN/NFV and 5G.  KT is leading the 5G technology development (along with SK Telecom) and is prepared to share that with AT&T.

“We expect that cooperation through AT&T’s SDN/NFV leadership and KT’s 5G leadership will create synergies to solve challenges of the telecom industry in the future,” said Mr. Lee.

Lee Dong-myeon (left), director of the KT Technology Convergence Center and John Donovan, CSO of AT&T.

Lee Dong-myeon director of the KT Technology Convergence Center and John Donovan, AT&T Chief Strategy Officer.                                                                         Photo courtesy of Business Korea

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KT and AT&T Working with Other Companies on 5G Development & Deployment:

Is an unofficial consortium of 5G carriers in the works?  It appears so, despite each one has their own proprietary spec for the 5G Radio Access Network/air interface, which won’t be standardized by ITU-R till the end of 2020.

Korea Telecom (KT) is not working exclusively with AT&T on 5G development; it is also collaborating with Verizon and even managed to show the fruits of their labor recently when the world’s first hologram call was completed over a test 5G connection with Verizon’s help. Verizon, meanwhile, managed to achieve a 1.6Gbps live wireless network in a field test at the recent Indy 500 event in Indianapolis. This sort of globetrotting approach seems to be defining the development of 5G. Worldwide players like Nokia and Ericsson are signing early 5G development, testing, and deployment deals with carriers worldwide.

SDxCentral noted that AT&T cited an announcement last year to work with several companies on speeding 5G deployments. Companies named included China Mobile, Deutsche Telekom, Ericsson, Huawei, Intel, KDDI, LG, Nokia, NTT DoCoMo, Qualcomm, Samsung, SK Telecom, Telstra, and Vodafone.  AT&T has been one of the telecommunication industry’s most aggressive operators in terms of network virtualization plans. The carrier said it virtualized 34 percent of its network functions by the end of 2016, is on track to hit its year-end 2017 goal of 55 percent virtualization, and could exceed its previous guidance of 75 percent control by 2020.

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5G Launch Plans for AT&T and KT:

  • AT&T plans to launch commercial 5G services by late 2018. The mega carrier said this April, it will launch 5G network trials in more than 20 markets by year-end 2017.  As we’ve repeatedly noted, that’s well in advance of the ITU-R WP 5D standards on IMT 2020, which will be completed by year-end 2020. See Addendum below for a quick peek at the ITU-R WP 5D meeting, being held this week and next at Niagra Falls, Canada.
  • KT has said it plans to launch commercial 5G services by 2019. The country’s operators are expected to support 5G trial services connected with the 2018 Winter Olympics scheduled for Pyeongchang, South Korea.

KT and Verizon on Network Orchestrator Interoperability:

KT earlier this year made an agreement with Verizon to test interoperability of their respective network orchestration platforms. KT said the agreement included the expansion of their geographical coverage areas by having the Verizon orchestrator interoperate with the KT orchestrator.

During the testing, KT said they were able to create a secure connection between the orchestrators, and instantiated a virtual firewall for each side through the NFV orchestration federation. The feasibility of the orchestrator federation was tested and verified.

Verizon is also working with KT on 5G technology through its Open Trial Specification Alliance.

Verizon has said it views NFV and SDN as foundational to its 5G plans. The carrier is currently trialing 5G services in a handful of markets, with plans for a commercial launch by late 2018.

Agility for NFV & SDN Deployments:

Cisco recently released results of a survey of service providers that showed “agility” as the top driver for their NFV and SDN deployments. That need for agility was touted in a separate report by Technology Business Research as a key factor for launching new services as the telecom industry moves towards 5G deployments (mostly in advance of the official 5G/IMT 2020 standards from ITU-R WP 5D.

“An agile network with the ability to rapidly launch new services will become more important as the industry approaches 5G, which bears promise of a vibrant Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem with widespread IoT service offerings,” said TBR analyst Kate Price. “Future network requirements will include high bandwidth and low latency. While this transition is likely to begin closer to 2020, it is top of mind as operators plan the future of their networks.”

Conclusions:

5G deployments will involve much more than the Radio Access Network (RAN) and will include various types of NFV, SDN, Network Orchestrator functionality. It is in that area that carriers collaboration appears to be focused, because each one has their own proprietary RAN spec for 5G deployment well in advance of the 5G/IMT 2020 standard from ITU-R WP 5D in late 2020.  Please refer to the Addendum for a snapshot of the current ITU-R WP5D meeting.

Addendum:  ITU-R WP5D IMT 2020 Meeting 13 June- to 21 June 2017:

  • The Chairman of ITU-R WP5D is Mr Stephen Blust of AT&T.
  • There’s one or more U.S. delegates from these companies/government agencies:  AT&T, Verizon, Sprint, Dish Network, Echo Star/Hughes Network Systems, NTIA, Intel, Apple, Cisco, NASA, FCC, U.S. Dept of Commerce, U.S. State Dept.  The most delegates appear to be from China.
  • Many sub working groups (SWGs) will meet, including: SWGs on Frequency Arrangements, IMT-Specifications, IMT-AV, Usage, Coordination, Radio Aspects, Evaluation, Spectrum Aspects, and many others.
  • These SWGs are under various Working Groups (WGs), including: General Aspects, Spectrum Aspects, Technical Aspects.
  • The SWG assignments to WGs are as follows:
  1. WG GENERAL ASPECTS: SWG CIRCULAR, SWG IMT-AV, SWG PPDR, SWG USAGE
  2. WG SPECTRUM ASPECTS: SWG FREQUENCY ARRANGEMENTS, SWG SHARING STUDIES
  3. WG TECHNOLOGY ASPECTS: SWG COORDINATION, SWG EVALUATION, SWG IMT SPECIFICATIONS, SWG OUT OF BAND EMISSIONS (OOBE), SWG RADIO ASPECTS
  • There are several contributions to the SWG on IMT 2020 Evaluation (criteria) directed at the preliminary draft new Report ITU-R M.[IMT-2020.EVAL]
  • Reference: A 23 Feb 2017 draft report on “Minimum requirements related to technical performance for IMT-2020 radio interface(s)” can be downloaded here. It was described in this techblog post.
  • The WP5D closing plenary session will be held on Wednesday afternoon 21 June 2017.
  • There will be an ITU-R WP 5D Workshop on IMT-2020 terrestrial radio interfaces on 4 October 2017, 9:00-17:00 hours in Munich, Germany.  It’s coincident with the next WP 5D meeting and those attending do not need to register separately for the workshop.  Others do.  Registration info to be provided at a later date.

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