100% of telcos are investigating the promise of OpenRAN – survey

With monstrous investments on the horizon, it seems the telco community is keeping a close eye on the development of OpenRAN technologies.

While you always have to take survey results with a pinch of salt, Mavenir and Senza Fili are claiming momentum is gathering behind the Telecom Infra Project’s (TIP) OpenRAN initiative. 100% of the respondents to the survey suggested they were investigating the application of OpenRAN for one scenario or another.

What is worth noting, is that trialling and testing the technology is very different from commercial deployment, thought the results do perhaps suggest the industry is sick of the status quo and would welcome some sort of disruption to ease the financial burden.

68% of the respondents claim they or the wider business is exploring OpenRAN for densification demands, 47% pointed towards greenfield deployments in urban environments, 42% are looking to replace their incumbent suppliers and 5% are seeking validation in the rural areas.

Whatever the reason, the tier-one vendors in the network infrastructure segments should watch these developments with care.

Interestingly enough, the results of this survey are being touted at the same time as a Vodafone win for the OpenRAN initiative. The telco recently announced plans to trial OpenRAN deployments in 100+ rural locations across the UK. The reasoning behind this trial; to reduce the cost of network deployment and create new opportunities to work with alternative suppliers.

When you consider the majority of network deployment investment is geared towards the access network, you can start to see why a lack of competition is concerning telcos. Another factor to consider is the role of Huawei. If the US Government gets its way, either bankrupting the Chinese vendor or getting it banned from markets, there is even less competition, enhancing the risk of increased prices.

However, those privileged vendors sitting comfortably at the top of the ecosystem might be given some relief. Firstly, these are only trials not commercial deployment. OpenRAN might be a nice idea, but telcos will be hard-pushed to replace a tried and tested solution; interest and signing cheques are two very different matters.

Secondly, the industry is still clearly concerned with how much of a valid alternative OpenRAN actually is. When looking at the barriers, 28% are worried the performance won’t match the status quo, while 14% are focused on interoperability and 11% on maturity. It isn’t clear whether this is maturity of the technology or the new vendors entering the ecosystem, but both would be a concern for anyone handing over vast sums of cash.

OpenRAN does seem to be gathering pace, and while there is still a lot to prove when it comes to overhauling proven relationships and suppliers, the quest for more efficient investments is clear to see.