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标题: E三毛公开投奔vRAN了。。。。。。。 [查看完整版帖子] [打印本页]

时间: 2021-6-22 16:27

作者: CTUSER 标题: E三毛公开投奔vRAN了。。。。。。。

本帖最后由 CTUSER 于 2021-6-22 18:24 编辑

大新闻，E也开始研发虚拟化RAN产品了。无线行业俩三年内要巨变。
https://www.lightreading.com/5g/ericsson-lets-intel-inside-as-mid-band-5g-gets-cloudy/d/d-id/770367?

Ericsson lets Intel inside as mid-band 5G gets cloudy

At almost any Ericsson-equipped 5G site today, both the radio at the top of the mast and the compute gubbins at its base are supplied by the Swedish vendor. But a change that would have been unthinkable just a few years ago is now coming.

Under a deal announced today, customers deploying all-important mid-band spectrum for their 5G services will effectively be able to use general-purpose equipment based on Intel silicon instead of Ericsson's compute hardware.

Why would Ericsson offer this and potentially lose the revenues it generates from compute hardware sales? Largely because some of the world's biggest operators have been demanding "virtualized" products from their suppliers. In the traditional set-up, Ericsson's compute hardware and software are interdependent and tightly coupled. Virtualization would pry them apart and allow Intel inside, running Ericsson's software on top.

Tier 1 service providers such as Verizon, which apparently worked with Ericsson on the development of the latest products, believe virtualization will bring benefits. Hardware and software decoupling, for instance, would allow operators to set up "baseband hotels," or data facilities that aggregate the compute hardware usually installed at sites. Instead of having a baseband deployment for every cell in the network, an operator could potentially serve numerous sites with less equipment and a leaner operating model.
The familiar rebuke is that general-purpose equipment is no match for customized products on performance and energy consumption. But the gap may be shrinking. "One year ago, I wouldn't have guessed we would already be here," says Per Narvinger, Ericsson's head of product area networks. "Intel has made huge progress in the last 12 months."

Pedal to the metal for x86

Improvements have come partly thanks to RAN-optimized software libraries in Intel silicon and what are known as hardware "accelerators." These typically pair x86 processors with chips known as field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) to improve throughput and energy consumption. Intel claims to have married the favorable elements of this FPGA technology with features of application specific integrated circuits (ASICs), the kind of customized chip found in Ericsson's traditional baseband gear.

The resulting "eASIC," according to Intel, would offload some of the compute-intensive processes, including a function known as forward error correction, to boost capacity. "General-purpose hardware has become more special purpose," says Narvinger.

Cloud RAN architecture might generate other benefits for operators, too. Even if the general-purpose hardware remains inferior to customized products on a like-for-like basis, the entire system could be more efficient. "The overall cost of operations and operational flexibility may be better in cloud RAN because you are sharing facilities, hardware and operations with other applications," says Gabriel Brown, a principal analyst with Heavy Reading.

But the appeal of Ericsson's cloud RAN products may be limited by upfront investment. The "fronthaul" connections between radios and baseband equipment need high-capacity fiber links between mobile sites and baseband hotels. Facilities are also required for those baseband hotels. "Today, cloud RAN is in play at relatively few operators," says Brown. "It hasn't quite taken off because you need a lot of investment in a switched fronthaul transport network."
Ericsson hopes to ease adoption through a software product called Cloud Link, allowing the cloud RAN to work in tandem with more traditional technology. "Operators can take something with a totally new technology and still connect it to the existing network and we call that bluefield," says Narvinger. "It is not like they have to take all the equipment they have bought from us over the years and throw that out of the window." Around 7 million radios it has already deployed could be used with the new cloud RAN products, Ericsson estimates.

Want to know more about 5G? Check out our dedicated 5G content channel here on Light Reading.
Nevertheless, another issue for Ericsson is that customers will have to wait until the second half of next year before mid-band cloud RAN is ready – an unusually long gap between a product announcement and the date of general availability. That could suit Intel's silicon roadmap and its introduction of even more capable processors under the Sapphire Rapids and Granite Rapids codenames.
Heavy Reading's Brown says this long lead time indicates Ericsson feels the need to put down a marker and make a public commitment on 5G virtualized RAN to counter competitors. But his medium-term view is that it will not leave Ericsson far behind its challengers. "Ericsson is proposing a relatively complete system," he says, citing the Cloud Link feature for interoperability with existing Ericsson deployments.

Another example is the work Ericsson is doing to optimize the cloud RAN architecture itself. "The company expects to optimize how fronthaul and the edge cloud infrastructure interwork," says Brown. "This is important for workload scaling and, in time, could see fronthaul integrated with the edge data center switching."
Virtualized, but not yet open
The deal with Intel is bound to be assessed in the context of open RAN, an initiative that aims to scrap any proprietary use of interfaces so that operators can build truly multivendor networks. An open fronthaul interface, for example, would allow Ericsson's baseband software, running on Intel's hardware, to be used in conjunction with another supplier's radios. Ericsson is stopping short of that for now.
"Everyone agrees that an important first step is to go to cloud and virtualization and that is what we are enabling," says Narvinger. "We are using the same interface that we have in purpose-built and that is why we can have this Cloud Link working. Then we will see over time what happens with open fronthaul."
Even so, Intel is not the only hardware company that stands to benefit from the launch of Ericsson's cloud RAN products. HPE has already been named as a maker of servers that will incorporate Intel's processors in the Ericsson network. "In the end, we see that our customers will procure the servers independently of us," says Narvinger. "That is disaggregation of hardware and software and that is a major technology shift."
By contrast, there is no commercial role yet for Nvidia, a designer of graphical processing units (GPUs) that was first named as a cloud RAN partner in October 2019. Narvinger insists the goal is to ensure products can eventually work on any platform in any cloud. "We have built a cloud RAN solution that we see as agnostic," he says. "You are not going to be able to support all platforms from day one."
Short of current alternative server platforms that use Arm-based processors or GPUs, Intel and x86 still look like the main beneficiaries of RAN virtualization.
This week's update should not be a massive surprise, important though it is. Ericsson had first promised cloud RAN products for mid-band deployments in October last year as a follow-up to the less-demanding low-band cloud RAN systems coming later in 2021.
"It is under-appreciated that Ericsson has been close to virtual RAN and open RAN for a long time," says Brown. "They have consistently said that if this turns out to be the best way to build a RAN, they will do it." Intel will be delighted.

时间: 2021-6-22 17:05

作者: 布洛芬缓释

华为不支持翻不起浪花

时间: 2021-6-22 17:25

作者: 客家人

爱立信在海外市场规模很大，很有影响力

时间: 2021-6-22 17:29

作者: silverbullet21

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时间: 2021-6-22 18:26

作者: CTUSER

silverbullet21 发表于 2021-6-22 17:29
老新闻了，产品被运营商骂惨了。

不对吧，自己看看，明年年底才提交产品呢，现在是开发阶段！
这是E第一次公开自己的vRAN 产品路线图。

时间: 2021-6-22 18:28

作者: CTUSER

silverbullet21 发表于 2021-6-22 17:29
老新闻了，产品被运营商骂惨了。

Nevertheless, another issue for Ericsson is that customers will have to wait until the second half of next year before mid-band cloud RAN is ready – an unusually long gap between a product announcement and the date of general availability.

2022年底出样机。

时间: 2021-6-22 19:03

作者: SOHU2021

没有菊厂的支持，这些都是纸老虎

时间: 2021-6-22 19:16

作者: axuan

这么脏的企业讲这些不埋汰么

时间: 2021-6-22 19:38

作者: CTUSER

客家人发表于 2021-6-22 17:25
爱立信在海外市场规模很大，很有影响力

五大厂商，除了菊花都开始做vRAN了！
并且三星的有了VDF UK做客户。N找了谷歌云做合作方。
E看似节奏慢些。不过至少也明确有路线图了。

时间: 2021-6-22 19:51

作者: zhishiyilisha

不是通信小屁民能左右的

时间: 2021-6-22 21:30

作者: wqfreebird

本帖最后由 wqfreebird 于 2021-6-23 08:00 编辑

爱立信做CloudRAN，其实只是OpenRAN的一部分，就是BBU的硬件通用化。但是前传接口仍然坚守不开放。
至今仍然不懂爱立信和NOKIA为什么这么支持OpenRAN。在美国，前期有暗流在推美国本土OpenRAN设备优先的原则；在欧洲，做OpenRAN就是为了在爱立信、NOKIA之外准备第三家供应商。也就是爱立信和NOKIA做OpenRAN最多就是表个态，邀邀功，但是别人这么做就是要革这两家的命。

时间: 2021-6-22 21:38

作者: pandersmall

wqfreebird 发表于2021-06-22 21:30:22 <p>爱立信做CloudRAN，其实只是OpenRAN的一部分，就是BBU的硬件通用化。但是前传接口...

你说的很对，vran和open ran还是有很大区别的，爱立信做的是虚拟化，云化，可以远端安装配置，但接口不会开放的

时间: 2021-6-22 21:43

作者: 六韬三略

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时间: 2021-6-22 22:20

作者: 家园会员

wqfreebird 发表于 2021-6-22 21:30
爱立信做CloudRAN，其实只是OpenRAN的一部分，就是BBU的硬件通用化。但是前传接口仍然坚守不开放。
至今仍 ...

不管是oran也好 vran也罢。你不做别人就会抢先。
vdf uk单子就是例子，活生生的被samsung nec拿走了！爱立信也很无奈。

时间: 2021-6-22 22:21

作者: silverbullet21

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时间: 2021-6-22 22:52

作者: 客家人

silverbullet21 发表于 2021-6-22 22:21
首先三毛是2020年底宣布了vRAN或者说cloudRAN的portfolio的。
其次，三毛宣布的这个产品和其三年前的clo ...

vdf都开始拥抱open ran

时间: 2021-6-22 22:58

作者: silverbullet21

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时间: 2021-6-22 23:03

作者: CTUSER

本帖最后由 CTUSER 于 2021-6-22 23:06 编辑

silverbullet21 发表于 2021-6-22 22:21
首先三毛是2020年底宣布了vRAN或者说cloudRAN的portfolio的。
其次，三毛宣布的这个产品和其三年前的clo ...

你看内容不？
三毛上代虚拟ran是基于英伟达gpu的，这次要换通用cpu了。根本不是一个东西。
这是今天的新闻。他说的next就是明年底。

时间: 2021-6-22 23:05

作者: CTUSER

客家人发表于 2021-6-22 22:52
vdf都开始拥抱open ran

三毛这个不是open ran。他的接口不开放。是虚拟vran.

时间: 2021-6-22 23:28

作者: silverbullet21

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时间: 2021-6-23 08:43

作者: yugalee

Ericsson is stopping short of that for now.
"Everyone agrees that an important first step is to go to cloud and virtualization and that is what we are enabling," says Narvinger. "We are using the same interface that we have in purpose-built and that is why we can have this Cloud Link working. Then we will see over time what happens with open fronthaul."
这个就是把虚拟化从核心网下到BBU。和Open不Open没什么关系

时间: 2021-6-23 09:01

作者: lujie5000

V-RAN可用搞，是网络演进发展趋势，但O-RAN必然失败。

时间: 2021-6-23 09:08

作者: qkb_75@163.com

爱立信让英特尔进入，因为中频段5G变得阴云密布

如今

在几乎所有爱立信装备的5G站点上，桅杆顶部的无线电和底部的计算机gubbins都是由瑞典供应商提供的。但就在几年前还不可想象的变化现在正在到来。

根据今天宣布的一项协议，为5G服务部署所有重要中频频谱的客户将能够有效地使用基于英特尔硅芯片的通用设备，而不是爱立信的计算硬件。

为什么爱立信会提供这样的服务，并可能失去其从计算机硬件销售中获得的收入？很大程度上是因为世界上一些最大的运营商一直要求供应商提供“虚拟化”产品。在传统的架构中，爱立信的计算硬件和软件是相互依赖、紧密耦合的。虚拟化将把它们分开，让英特尔进入，在上面运行爱立信的软件。

Verizon等一级服务提供商相信虚拟化将带来好处。Verizon显然与爱立信合作开发最新产品。例如，硬件和软件的解耦将允许运营商建立“基带酒店”，或数据设施，将通常安装在站点上的计算硬件聚合在一起。运营商不必为网络中的每个小区都部署基带，而是可以用更少的设备和更精简的运营模式为众多站点提供服务。

常见的指责是，通用设备在性能和能耗上都无法与定制产品匹敌。但差距可能正在缩小。”“一年前，我还没想到我们已经在这里了，”爱立信产品区域网络主管Per Narvinger说英特尔在过去12个月里取得了巨大进步。”

x86的金属踏板

改进部分归功于英特尔硅芯片上的RAN优化软件库和所谓的硬件“加速器”。这些加速器通常将x86处理器与称为现场可编程门阵列（fpga）的芯片配对，以提高吞吐量和能耗。英特尔声称已经将这种FPGA技术的有利因素与应用特定集成电路（ASIC）的特性结合起来，ASIC是爱立信传统基带设备中的一种定制芯片。

英特尔称，由此产生的“eASIC”将减轻一些计算密集型进程的负担，包括一种称为前向纠错的功能，以提高容量通用硬件已经变得更加专用，”纳文格说。

云计算架构也可能为运营商带来其他好处。即使通用硬件在同类基础上仍然不如定制产品，整个系统的效率也会更高。”

cloud-RAN的总体运营成本和运营灵活性可能会更好，因为您与其他应用程序共享设施、硬件和运营，”Heavy Reading的首席分析师Gabriel Brown说。

但爱立信云计算产品的吸引力可能会受到前期投资的限制。无线电和基带设备之间的“前程”连接需要移动站点和基带酒店之间的高容量光纤链路。这些基带酒店也需要设施。”如今，云计算在相对较少的运营商中发挥作用它还没有完全启动，因为您需要在交换式前线运输网络上进行大量投资。”

爱立信希望通过一款名为Cloud Link的软件产品，让Cloud-RAN能够与更传统的技术协同工作，从而简化采用过程。”运营商可以用一种全新的技术获取一些东西，并且仍然将其连接到现有的网络上，我们称之为bluefield爱立信估计，他们已经部署了大约700万台收音机，可以与新的云计算产品一起使用。

想进一步了解5G吗？在Light Reading上查看我们专用的5G内容频道。

尽管如此，爱立信面临的另一个问题是，客户必须等到明年下半年才能准备好中频段cloud RAN——从产品发布到正式上市日期之间的时间间隔异常长。这可能符合英特尔的硅路线图，以及在蓝宝石Rapids和花岗岩Rapids代号下推出更强大的处理器。

Heavy Reading的Brown表示，这么长的交付周期表明，爱立信认为有必要在5G虚拟化RAN上下一个标记，并作出公开承诺，以对抗竞争对手。但他的中期观点是，这不会让爱立信远远落后于竞争对手。”爱立信提出了一个相对完整的系统，”他说，并引用云链接功能与现有的爱立信部署的互操作性。

另一个例子是爱立信为优化云计算体系结构本身所做的工作。”该公司希望优化fronthaul和edge云基础设施的交互工作方式这对于工作负载的扩展非常重要，而且随着时间的推移，fronthaul可以与edge数据中心交换集成。”

虚拟化，但尚未开放

与英特尔的交易必然会在open-RAN的背景下进行评估，open-RAN是一项旨在废除任何对接口的专有使用的举措，以便运营商能够构建真正的多供应商网络。例如，一个开放的fronthaul接口将允许运行在英特尔硬件上的爱立信基带软件与另一家供应商的无线电配合使用。爱立信目前还没有做到这一点。

“每个人都同意，重要的第一步是走向云和虚拟化，而这正是我们正在实现的，”Narvinger说我们使用的是专门构建的相同接口，这就是为什么我们可以让这个云链接工作的原因。然后，我们将看到随着时间的推移，开放式前线运输会发生什么。”

即便如此，英特尔并不是唯一一家受益于爱立信云计算产品发布的硬件公司。HPE已经被命名为服务器制造商，将在爱立信网络中集成英特尔的处理器。”最终，我们看到我们的客户将独立于我们采购服务器这是硬件和软件的分解，是一个重大的技术转变。”

相比之下，图形处理单元（GPU）的设计师Nvidia在2019年10月首次被指定为云计算合作伙伴，目前还没有商业角色。Narvinger坚持说，目标是确保产品最终能够在任何云计算的任何平台上工作。”“我们已经构建了一个云计算解决方案，我们认为它是不可知论的，”他说从第一天起，您将无法支持所有平台。”

除了目前使用基于Arm处理器或gpu的服务器平台之外，Intel和x86看起来仍然是RAN虚拟化的主要受益者。

本周的更新不应该是一个巨大的惊喜，虽然它是重要的。爱立信在去年10月首次承诺为中频段部署提供云计算产品，作为2021年晚些时候推出的要求较低的低频段云计算系统的后续产品。

布朗说：“爱立信很长一段时间以来一直与虚拟RAN和开放RAN保持密切关系，这一点没有得到应有的重视。”他们一直说，如果这是构建RAN的最佳方式，他们会这么做。

时间: 2021-6-23 09:23

作者: chengaoSX

大势所趋

时间: 2021-6-23 09:27

作者: 大叔的哥

时间: 2021-6-23 09:53

作者: lyywxhq1981

这种口水新闻真真假假的就别吵了，ORAN是要革传统设备商的命，能不能革？是不是方向再说，但电信设备商再不济，就这么几个玩家，以前过的多舒服啊，爱立信本来过的就很舒服，NOKIA之前不行，华为受打压，又舒服起来了，现在正是爱立信和诺基亚最好的时候，真心支持ORAN，把封闭市场的利润培养一大堆红海厂家革自己的命，想什么呢，资本是最现实的。

时间: 2021-6-23 10:19

作者: jnjn

布洛芬缓释发表于 2021-6-22 17:05
华为不支持翻不起浪花

支持华为5G封杀欧美市场，让欧美用不上全球领先的5G

时间: 2021-6-23 17:06

作者: flydo

布洛芬缓释发表于 2021-6-22 17:05
华为不支持翻不起浪花

这帖明显是想过来带华为节奏的。有时候我真觉得那些招黑的言论是一些黑子专门帮华为招黑的。

时间: 2021-6-23 19:11

作者: ybobby

这个不好说，也许不做是等死，做了是找死，你不做别人做，还是死，之前吵吵的SDN OF交换机也是这样，不过呢，国内运营商现在无论是网络云还是私有云，还不是采用商业交换机，因为每次集采价格太便宜了，驱动力不足，海外另当别论了，有一个问题，运营商的BBU x86后，所有的CT厂商都会让被intel 控制，这是他们最不想看到的吧。

时间: 2021-6-23 22:47

作者: 家园会员

无线通信行业要巨变。。

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