Nokia O-RAN Update

November 2021

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 Agenda •

•
Overview of
O-RAN
What is it?
• Nokia O-RAN
contribution
• Way forward and
questions to be
answered

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Key areas of O-RAN
Three main pillars build on technical specification work

O-RAN Alliance O-RAN

objective TCO reduction

Interoperability HW/SW Programmability

Key enablers (Multi Vendor) separation Intelligence

Open interfaces Cloud RAN 5G Near Realtime

Nokia solution Open Fronthaul vDU/vCU RIC

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O-RAN architecture
Functions and interfaces can be selected/deployed independently
Interface Status in O-RAN alliance
Open RAN Service Management &
Orchestration (SMO)
Is not clearly specified. It can be
A1 F1 Spec not completed yet
interpreted in different ways. O-RAN O1
can be considered as a subset. RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC) W1 Spec not completed yet

E2
O-RAN E1 Spec not completed yet
refers to the interfaces and CU-CP (E1) CU-UP gNB

architecture elements as shown, X2/Xn

X2
X2 spec available for Non-
specified by the O-RAN Alliance F1 F1 Stand Alone (NSA) EN-DC.

Distributed
Xn Spec not completed yet
unit (DU)
OpenRAN (w/o space)
Is a project group inside the TIP eCPRI7-
FH eCPRI 7-2x spec available
(Telecom Infra Project). Target is to 2x (“front-haul”)

Radio unit E2 Spec available

“… define and build 2G, 3G, 4G, and (RU) DU+RU
5G RAN solutions…”
F1 applicable in Cloud A1 Spec available
• vRAN 1.0: vCU + (DU + RU)
Oran • vRAN 2.0: vCU + vDU + RU O1 Spec available
A city at the Mediterranean sea in F1 not applicable in Classic

Algeria  • AirScale BBU: CU+DU O2 Spec not completed yet

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What about Cloud RAN? O-RAN and vRAN are inter-related

Cloudification is one of the fundamental tenants of O-RAN

vRAN / Cloud RAN Application O-RAN / Interfaces

• “Vertical openness” vDU, vCU • “Horizontal openness”
Open interfaces, white box

F1 (Option 2 split)
• Targets the separation of •

MANO / Other
baseband hardware and Virtualization / approach, Open Source
software Containerization • multi-vendor option

Fronthaul

E2, O1, X2
applicable to Classical RAN

Midhaul
• multi-vendor option •
Hardware and vRAN

eCPRI
• work commenced before
O-RAN DataCenter x86

Example:
Core
O-RAN with O-RAN eCPRI
Network
Classical RAN open open

Example:
Core
O-RAN with O-RAN eCPRI vDU F1 vCU open
Network
open
vRAN2.0 open

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