5G RAN Evolution: From Cloud RAN, FlexRAN to virtual RAN

Rising Network operation costs from increased high-speed data demand continues to be a business issue for mobile operators at the same time that average revenue per user (ARPU) is flat or declining. In order to meet the demand for high-speed data without losing money, operators are looking for a more cost-effective way to provide data service. Network functions virtualization (NFV) is a fast-growing framework that is facilitating the move of all fixed and radio access networks (RAN) functions from proprietary, stand-alone, vendor-locked appliances to virtualized applications running on high volume servers and switches. This includes real-time, latency-sensitive signal and data processing. In practice, most carriers are concentrating their CAPEX spending on the RAN – specifically on the mobile base station move to support low-latency data processing demands of cloud-based radio access network (RAN) and 5G.

Utilizing COTS x86 Server Appliance to easily deploy

FlexRAN is based on Intel Xeon or FPGA virtualization RAN architecture, to realize MEC (Multi-Access Edge Computing) and network slicing technologies to easily realize scalable flexibility. Fulfill multiple scenario 5G applications like vRAN, MEC, to provide high through and low-latency 5G wireless connectivity.

Advantage of FlexRAN or Cloud RAN

• Lower total cost of ownership
• Break away from vendor lock
• Enables mobile edge computing at the metro and network edge
• Future-proofing RAN investment, 5G-ready platform
• Perfect for in-building and metro deployments

Recommend Hardware

HTCA-6600 is designed in 6U, with six CPU Blades and a combination of six Ethernet NI/switch blade slots. With two Intel® Xeon® E5-2600 v3/v4 CPUs and sixteen DDR4 R-DIMM sockets for each blade as stated above, HTCA-6600 comes with six front-cabling, swappable Ethernet NI/switch blades. The top 2 blade slots are reserved for switch or Ethernet NI blades, while the other four slots are solely used for Ethernet NI blades, which delivers thirty-two 10GbE ports. As the higher-end model, HTCA-6600 is designed with switch blade and CPU blade redundancy. In case one of the blades is encountered with failure, the other will take all the work loads.

Feature Product

HTCA-6600

High Availability Chassis 6U Telecom Network Appliance with 6 x86 CPU Blades and 6 I/O Blades

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