Nokia launches app store for broadband networks

Kit vendor Nokia’s new Altiplano Application Marketplace will host its own apps as well as third party and operator built apps.

The Altiplano Application Marketplace – named after Nokia’s broadband network controller suite – will launch with seven apps designed around the functions of network support, network insights and network automation.

Network support apps are intended to be used by operators to maintain and protect fixed networks through proactive monitoring, performance analysis and incident management, while network insights apps are supposed to provide actionable insights as you’d expect, and the automation apps are designed to help automate and optimize a network and provide service and subscriber operations to increase efficiency.

Apps from operators and third parties will also be hosted there later on. In conjunction Nokia is launching the Altiplano Developer Portal which makes available a software development kit (SDK) and virtual lab environment for developers to build and test their own apps, which presumably can then be put on the marketplace as well.

We’re told operators can self-develop and organize their own applications within the marketplace, and can also use the developer portal to customize their network operations tools, personalise the user interface, customise APIs, add service profiles, and build their own network policies and automation workflows, should they be inclined.

“No two networks, and likewise no two automation solutions are alike,” said Geert Heyninck, Nokia’s VP Broadband Networks. “By opening up the Altiplano platform for developers, partners and customers to create and add applications, we’re pleased to offer exactly the flexibility they need.”

Fatima AlDaghar, Director of Fixed Access Planning, du, added: “We’re committing heavily in SDN to enhance performance, get insights, and improve services. All managed under a single platform in a multi-vendor environment. Nokia’s open App marketplace – the first of its kind – delivers sophisticated apps that address the requirements of marketing, planning, operations, and assures customer satisfaction.”

All apps currently available are from Nokia, and third party apps will be added in 2023. No doubt it all gets quite technical but the idea seems to be broadly about offering greater access to and analysis of networks through software, and providing a place for its partners to host their own.

Nokia’s chief kit vendor rival Ericsson has also made moves in this area at a much larger scale with the acquisition of cloud and API specialist Vonage for a whopping $6.2 billion. In an interview with Telecoms.com Hannes Ekström, Head of Strategy BNEW at Ericsson said of the move:

“We see a great opportunity in the in the ability to expose network capabilities towards developers and Vonage, by their own rights have a large base of developers who are developing APIs today. And so the marriage of Ericsson and Vonage… we believe we can be the catalyst together to make these APIs mobile and expose these mobile APIs to the developers.”

You can read the full interview with Ekström here.

Get the latest news straight to your inbox. Register for the Telecoms.com newsletter here.