• DISH Network has been elected to the O-RAN ALLIANCE’s Board of Directors
• O-RAN ALLIANCE’s Minimum Viable Plan to expedite the delivery of high-priority O-RAN functions
• 28 new or updated O-RAN specifications have been released since November 2020
• O-RAN Open Summit held on February 25, 2021 now available for re-play on O-RAN website
   

As of February 23, 2021, the O-RAN ALLIANCE welcomes DISH Network as a new member of its Board of Directors.

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O-RAN Logical Architecture (Graphic: Business Wire)

“Carriers around the world are recognizing the importance of building next-generation, programmable networks that are open, intelligent and flexible, making the work of the O-RAN ALLIANCE more critical than ever,” said Sidd Chenumolu, DISH vice president of technology development. “At DISH, we are in a unique position as we build a 5G network entirely upon O-RAN standards, and the work of this organization creates a unified roadmap as our partners join us in developing a disaggregated and open RAN. We look forward to playing a continued role in the success of the O-RAN ALLIANCE and the development of standards that enhance connectivity worldwide.”

O-RAN ALLIANCE’s Minimum Viable Plan (MVP) Towards Commercial O-RAN Solutions

O-RAN’s specification effort, open software development, as well as testing and integration, will focus on priorities set by its operator members. This approach will allow the O-RAN ecosystem players to prioritize the delivery of a minimum viable set of end-to-end O-RAN solutions applicable in commercial networks.

The first release of the MVP includes already published specifications and additional work items in the area of:

• Open fronthaul specifications provide fully specified control, user and synchronization interface, management plane interface between O-RU and O-DU, and relevant conformance and interoperability tests, enabling multi-vendor interoperability.
• Open transport defines the requirements of xhaul transport, proposes the best practices of deploying WDM and IP technologies in xhaul.
• Open hardware offers hardware reference designs for different modes of indoor picocell, outdoor microcell, outdoor Macrocell and open fronthaul gateway to accelerate the use of whitebox and facilitate RAN ecosystem diversity.
• Open stack provides a software reference design for O-CU/O-DU architecture, interfaces, internal modules, and APIs, to promote and guide the open source software development.
• Open cloud presents O-Cloud reference design with the fundamental synchronization requirements and real life deployment recommendations.
• Testing and integration sets the criteria and guidelines for the formation of Open Testing and Integration Centers (OTICs), ensuring consistency and quality of the testing of O-RAN products and solutions.
   

Subsequent O-RAN releases will extend the MVP with additional features and functionalities based on continuing surveys and updates of operators’ deployment priorities.

28 New or Updated O-RAN Specifications Released since November 2020

On February 26, 2021, the O-RAN ALLIANCE published another 28 specification documents, including 10 new titles. For more details on the new specifications, please check this O-RAN blog post. To download O-RAN specifications, please proceed to www.o-ran.org/specifications.

O-RAN Open Summit Held on February 25, 2021 Available for Re-play

The O-RAN Open Summit on February 25, 2021 has gained attention with more than 2500 global visitors. The recording of Open Summit is available at the O-RAN website. The recording includes full content of the event, including five keynotes:

• Opening address - Alex Jinsung Choi, COO of O-RAN ALLIANCE and SVP Technology Strategy & Innovation of Deutsche Telekom
• Chairman address - Andre Fuetsch, Chairman of the O-RAN ALLIANCE and Chief Technology Officer of AT&T
• O-RAN Technical progress - Chih-Lin I, Co-Chair of O-RAN Technical Steering Committee and China Mobile Chief Scientist, Wireless Technologies, China Mobile Research Institute
• Testing and Integration Focus Group update - David Orloff, Co-chair of O-RAN Testing and Integration Focus Group, AT&T
• O-RAN Software Community update - Jack Murray, Co-Chair of OSC Technical Oversight Committee, AT&T
   

The event recording also includes the panel discussion on ‘Paths to O-RAN implementation’ providing valuable insights on possible ways towards open RAN introduction in the public mobile networks. The panelists represent a great variety of players in the O-RAN ecosystem: AT&T, NTT DOCOMO, Orange, TIM, O-RAN ALLIANCE, Intel, Keysight, ONF, Nokia and Radisys.

About O-RAN ALLIANCE

The O-RAN ALLIANCE is a world-wide community of more than 270 mobile operators, vendors, and research & academic institutions operating in the Radio Access Network (RAN) industry. As the RAN is an essential part of any mobile network, the O-RAN ALLIANCE’s mission is to re-shape the industry towards more intelligent, open, virtualized and fully interoperable mobile networks. The new O-RAN standards will enable a more competitive and vibrant RAN supplier ecosystem with faster innovation to improve user experience. O-RAN based mobile networks will at the same time improve the efficiency of RAN deployments as well as operations by the mobile operators. To achieve this, the O-RAN ALLIANCE publishes new RAN specifications, releases open software for the RAN, and supports its members in integration and testing of their implementations.

For more information please visit www.o-ran.org.

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