AT&T and Ericsson have announced the commencement of deploying Ericsson Cloud RAN technology on AT&T’s 5G network.
The partnership between AT&T and Ericsson has resulted into a milestone with the completion of a Cloud RAN call, marking progress in the deployment of Open RAN. AT&T has transitioned traffic onto Cloud RAN sites, with the initial sites situated south of Dallas, Texas.
The configuration utilized for the Cloud RAN call has been integrated into the AT&T network, laying the groundwork for third-party vendors to leverage this configuration for Open RAN in the future.
Chris Sambar, Head of Network at AT&T, expressed, “This is the next milestone in AT&T’s Open RAN journey. By migrating traffic to cloud RAN sites, we’re expediting our c-band deployment and advancing the virtualization of our network. The future of an open network is rapidly approaching, and we eagerly anticipate the innovations it will bring for our customers.”
Fredrik Jejdling, Head of Networks at Ericsson, said: “Innovating and staying ahead of technological shifts is inherent to Ericsson’s ethos. Our progress in collaboration with AT&T underscores our dedication to supporting their Open RAN vision.”
As part of the live deployment, AT&T and Ericsson have transitioned one frequency band, 3700MHz, for their C-Band traffic to Cloud RAN infrastructure. This step represents the partnership between AT&T and Ericsson in realizing the advantages of Cloud RAN, propelling AT&T closer to its objective of a open, adaptable, programmable wireless network.
