4 ms·

Wonder if someone could elaborate on the hardware or what makes cell network hardware unique? Isn't it all just chips, boards, and cables?

by beaner 7y ago

otoburb 7y ago
A modern wireless operator in its most simple terms is comprised of two very different networks: a radio access network of cell sites (aka RAN), and a data and packet processing network (aka Core). The two types of network are not heterogenous because their layer 1 characters are completely different (electromagnetic spectrum vs. wires), which has led to vendor specialization over the years as few companies are/were able to compete across the full suite of different workload characteristics demanded by data-plane and control-plane needs. Huawei's strength comes in their ability to provide an end-to-end turnkey solution for both types of networks at competitive prices with hardware & software that works.
- JTon 7y ago
  > Huawei's strength comes in their ability to provide an end-to-end turnkey solution for both types of networks at competitive prices with hardware & software that works Plus an army of support engineers to help you turn-up and operate your new network.
- likeabbas 7y ago
  Couldn’t one argue that their strength in cost efficiency was largely built on the theft of IP? Without the IP barriers western countries abide by, they were able to take the best technology from multiple companies, implement it and sell it at a fraction of the price?
  - freeflight 7y ago
    Sure one could argue that, but to do that convincingly it would probably best to bring concrete evidence of what IP was supposedly stolen to facilitate the Huawei tech.
    - trepanne 7y ago
      Huawei's theft of Cisco's IP is common knowledge, and well documented. https://blogs.cisco.com/news/huawei-and-ciscos-source-code-correcting-the-record https://blogs.cisco.com/news/huawei-and-ciscos-source-code-c...
      - v-yadli 7y ago
        yeah, STRCMP. And I wouldn't call it "documented", unless it provides references to the official reports. The link points to a Cisco site, and what would you expect Cisco to say? here's a legacy archive of the relevant articles from a Chinese third-party site: http://tech.sina.com.cn/focus/cisco_huawei/ http://tech.sina.com.cn/focus/cisco_huawei/ I'm a bit surprised it is still kept intact after some 20 years. You could see trails of history -- mind the "Google it" header at the top.
        trepanne 7y ago
        Ever used one of those Huawei routers? If you had, I think you'd be in little doubt about the extensive copying of IOS. Also the documentation, CLI... the entire business model was being a cheaper Cisco clone. You can pull down tons of news reports and even the court filings if you are motivated, but why? Huawei themselves publicly admitted to stealing Cisco's code, the only disagreement was about the scope. I suppose we should just accept at face value their claims, when caught, that it was just a little bit, and only by accident. Cisco is the only source for any part of the actual expert opinion. Huawei naturally declined Cisco's invitation to permit publishing the entire report; one can imagine how unfavorable it would be. Those published excerpts are smoking guns - concrete demonstration of wholesale cutting&pasting of Cisco source code, down to whitespace and comments, outside the scope of what Huawei was willing to admit to. By that time, though, Huawei had already achieved commercial success, and could afford to start cutting fewer corners & better comply with international law. So their plan worked pretty well. Huawei is right up there with semiconductor mfg as a poster child for government-condoned (even government-assisted) industrial espionage as a tool to bootstrap strategic industries. I'm not convinced that Huawei will backdoor their 5G gear, but I'm definitely on board with the plan to bar them from US commerce. Why play fair with opponents who cheat?
  - otoburb 7y ago
    >>Couldn’t one argue that their strength in cost efficiency was largely built on the theft of IP? There are plenty of accusations that this was the case -- I'm not going to comment on the veracity of those accusations. However, if it were true, then that would certainly be a huge factor why Huawei was able to catch up and overtake other domain players within a relatively short period of time. In defense of Huawei, I would like to point out that Bunnie Huang[1] noticed a certain type of generically Chinese innovation leading him to coin the term "Gongkai"[2][3], the effects of which led to him cataloguing and writing a book[4]. I think the combination of this laissez-faire "flexibility" around WTO-mandated IP rights and a grueling and debilitating 996[5] work ethic helped Huawei, among other Chinese companies, to catch up with Western firms pretty quickly. [2] https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 [3] https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4297 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4297 [4] https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4605 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4605 [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system
    - Gibbon1 7y ago
      > I think the combination of this laissez-faire "flexibility" around WTO-mandated IP rights and a grueling and debilitating 996[5] work ethic helped Huawei, among other Chinese companies, to catch up with Western firms pretty quickly. This is essentially copied from the Japanese. Japanese mega-corps far as I understand very often unofficially pooled patents and technology. That became an issue as dominance was asserted in the consumer electronics market as outsiders weren't in the club. Entry into an established market meant going up against a thicket of patents owned by multiple entities.
    - throw20102010 7y ago
      While we don't have any real evidence (from the sources that I read) that Huawei stole 5G tech, it's plausible. They've stolen tech in other areas and then iterated the design so fast that they beat the competition to market. We know for (nearly) certain that Huawei stole folding screen tech from Samsung (via a supplier), and now that Samsung has reneged on it's Galaxy Fold launch the Huawei folding phone will be first to market. Now that they have a reputation for stealing it is hard to view their other advancements as purely the result of honest work.
  - megous 7y ago
    One could also argue that IP hampers innovation and that this is a self-inflicted wound.
    - fmajid 7y ago
      Huawei doesn't share its IP with others, and is a very different beast to the gongkai entrepreneurs profiled by Andrew Huang.
  - fmajid 7y ago
    Not in the realm of 5G network equipment. As BT's McRae says, they are way ahead of their competitors, not something you can achieve by simply copying others' technology: https://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/bts-mcrae-huawei-is-the-only-true-5g-supplier-right-now/d/d-id/747734 https://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/bts-mcrae-huawei-is-t... The reality is that Huawei has been outspending its competitors in R&D by a wide margin for over two decades, because the latter are managed by bean counters in thrall to the stock market's short-term horizon. Eventually, the difference would show. One further wrinkle is that Chinese 5G uses frequencies like 3-4 GHz that are hogged by the military in the US. US carriers have to resort to millimeter wave frequencies in the 30+ GHz range that can't penetrate a door, let alone a building, and are thus mostly useless for 5G penetration outside a very few congested open-air locations, and thus their 5G technology is at a severe disadvantage over the Chinese one: https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/telecom/standards/how-america-can-prepare-to-live-in-chinas-5g-world https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/telecom/standards/how-am... Most countries not aligned with China or the West will prefer the Huawei technology: superior technology yet cheaper, and far less expensive to deploy and operate. Any country that doesn't puts itself at a competitive disadvantage over others that do. The US may yet convince its European allies to shun Huawei, but it will come at a severe cost.
    - downrightmike 7y ago
      If the Huawei tech operates on the same frequencies as US military tech, that is reason enough to see the embargo. It is one reason why LEO satellite internet has taken so long, because the plans typically get near some of the frequencies that old maritime GPS devices use and they can't be interrupted.
    - jjeaff 7y ago
      Just because their 5g tech is the best in no way prices they didn't steal ip to get where they are. I am not expert on networking equipment by any means. But I would assume that 5g equipment is built upon previous technology. It would thus follow that stealing the preceding, underlying technology and then focusing resources on building out the 5g part of the tech would be the fastest/cheapest way to become a leader in 5g.
    - 7y ago
vageli 7y ago
"Just" chips? The amount of research and development that goes into designing and fabricating chips used for wireless radio technologies is not so easily written off with a "just".
- beaner 7y ago
  I was hoping I could get away with an honest simple question without having to qualify all the assumptions and naïvities in it.
  - vageli 7y ago
    I mean, aren't chips just electrons, protons and neutrons? :) More seriously, the 5g spec is a complicated and long document. Implementing 5g functionality in silicon is not a weekend project and implementations tend to be protected by NDAs and kept as trade secrets, etc. Ultimately the rationale is that development of these technologies is a complex, non-open-source, and costly endeavor. The nuances of _why_ this is the status quo are more human than technical in nature.

Wonder if someone could elaborate on the hardware or what makes cell network hardware unique? Isn't it all just chips, boards, and cables?

by beaner 7y ago

Wonder if someone could elaborate on the hardware or what makes cell network hardware unique? Isn't it all just chips, boards, and cables?

otoburb 7y ago

A modern wireless operator in its most simple terms is comprised of two very different networks: a radio access network of cell sites (aka RAN), and a data and packet processing network (aka Core). The two types of network are not heterogenous because their layer 1 characters are completely different (electromagnetic spectrum vs. wires), which has led to vendor specialization over the years as few companies are/were able to compete across the full suite of different workload characteristics demanded by data-plane and control-plane needs. Huawei's strength comes in their ability to provide an end-to-end turnkey solution for both types of networks at competitive prices with hardware & software that works.

JTon 7y ago
> Huawei's strength comes in their ability to provide an end-to-end turnkey solution for both types of networks at competitive prices with hardware & software that works Plus an army of support engineers to help you turn-up and operate your new network.
likeabbas 7y ago
Couldn’t one argue that their strength in cost efficiency was largely built on the theft of IP? Without the IP barriers western countries abide by, they were able to take the best technology from multiple companies, implement it and sell it at a fraction of the price?
- freeflight 7y ago
  Sure one could argue that, but to do that convincingly it would probably best to bring concrete evidence of what IP was supposedly stolen to facilitate the Huawei tech.
  - trepanne 7y ago
    Huawei's theft of Cisco's IP is common knowledge, and well documented. https://blogs.cisco.com/news/huawei-and-ciscos-source-code-correcting-the-record https://blogs.cisco.com/news/huawei-and-ciscos-source-code-c...
    - v-yadli 7y ago
      yeah, STRCMP. And I wouldn't call it "documented", unless it provides references to the official reports. The link points to a Cisco site, and what would you expect Cisco to say? here's a legacy archive of the relevant articles from a Chinese third-party site: http://tech.sina.com.cn/focus/cisco_huawei/ http://tech.sina.com.cn/focus/cisco_huawei/ I'm a bit surprised it is still kept intact after some 20 years. You could see trails of history -- mind the "Google it" header at the top.
      - trepanne 7y ago
        Ever used one of those Huawei routers? If you had, I think you'd be in little doubt about the extensive copying of IOS. Also the documentation, CLI... the entire business model was being a cheaper Cisco clone. You can pull down tons of news reports and even the court filings if you are motivated, but why? Huawei themselves publicly admitted to stealing Cisco's code, the only disagreement was about the scope. I suppose we should just accept at face value their claims, when caught, that it was just a little bit, and only by accident. Cisco is the only source for any part of the actual expert opinion. Huawei naturally declined Cisco's invitation to permit publishing the entire report; one can imagine how unfavorable it would be. Those published excerpts are smoking guns - concrete demonstration of wholesale cutting&pasting of Cisco source code, down to whitespace and comments, outside the scope of what Huawei was willing to admit to. By that time, though, Huawei had already achieved commercial success, and could afford to start cutting fewer corners & better comply with international law. So their plan worked pretty well. Huawei is right up there with semiconductor mfg as a poster child for government-condoned (even government-assisted) industrial espionage as a tool to bootstrap strategic industries. I'm not convinced that Huawei will backdoor their 5G gear, but I'm definitely on board with the plan to bar them from US commerce. Why play fair with opponents who cheat?
- otoburb 7y ago
  >>Couldn’t one argue that their strength in cost efficiency was largely built on the theft of IP? There are plenty of accusations that this was the case -- I'm not going to comment on the veracity of those accusations. However, if it were true, then that would certainly be a huge factor why Huawei was able to catch up and overtake other domain players within a relatively short period of time. In defense of Huawei, I would like to point out that Bunnie Huang[1] noticed a certain type of generically Chinese innovation leading him to coin the term "Gongkai"[2][3], the effects of which led to him cataloguing and writing a book[4]. I think the combination of this laissez-faire "flexibility" around WTO-mandated IP rights and a grueling and debilitating 996[5] work ethic helped Huawei, among other Chinese companies, to catch up with Western firms pretty quickly. [2] https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?page_id=3107 [3] https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4297 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4297 [4] https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4605 https://www.bunniestudios.com/blog/?p=4605 [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/996_working_hour_system
  - Gibbon1 7y ago
    > I think the combination of this laissez-faire "flexibility" around WTO-mandated IP rights and a grueling and debilitating 996[5] work ethic helped Huawei, among other Chinese companies, to catch up with Western firms pretty quickly. This is essentially copied from the Japanese. Japanese mega-corps far as I understand very often unofficially pooled patents and technology. That became an issue as dominance was asserted in the consumer electronics market as outsiders weren't in the club. Entry into an established market meant going up against a thicket of patents owned by multiple entities.
  - throw20102010 7y ago
    While we don't have any real evidence (from the sources that I read) that Huawei stole 5G tech, it's plausible. They've stolen tech in other areas and then iterated the design so fast that they beat the competition to market. We know for (nearly) certain that Huawei stole folding screen tech from Samsung (via a supplier), and now that Samsung has reneged on it's Galaxy Fold launch the Huawei folding phone will be first to market. Now that they have a reputation for stealing it is hard to view their other advancements as purely the result of honest work.
- megous 7y ago
  One could also argue that IP hampers innovation and that this is a self-inflicted wound.
  - fmajid 7y ago
    Huawei doesn't share its IP with others, and is a very different beast to the gongkai entrepreneurs profiled by Andrew Huang.
- fmajid 7y ago
  Not in the realm of 5G network equipment. As BT's McRae says, they are way ahead of their competitors, not something you can achieve by simply copying others' technology: https://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/bts-mcrae-huawei-is-the-only-true-5g-supplier-right-now/d/d-id/747734 https://www.lightreading.com/mobile/5g/bts-mcrae-huawei-is-t... The reality is that Huawei has been outspending its competitors in R&D by a wide margin for over two decades, because the latter are managed by bean counters in thrall to the stock market's short-term horizon. Eventually, the difference would show. One further wrinkle is that Chinese 5G uses frequencies like 3-4 GHz that are hogged by the military in the US. US carriers have to resort to millimeter wave frequencies in the 30+ GHz range that can't penetrate a door, let alone a building, and are thus mostly useless for 5G penetration outside a very few congested open-air locations, and thus their 5G technology is at a severe disadvantage over the Chinese one: https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/telecom/standards/how-america-can-prepare-to-live-in-chinas-5g-world https://spectrum.ieee.org/tech-talk/telecom/standards/how-am... Most countries not aligned with China or the West will prefer the Huawei technology: superior technology yet cheaper, and far less expensive to deploy and operate. Any country that doesn't puts itself at a competitive disadvantage over others that do. The US may yet convince its European allies to shun Huawei, but it will come at a severe cost.
  - downrightmike 7y ago
    If the Huawei tech operates on the same frequencies as US military tech, that is reason enough to see the embargo. It is one reason why LEO satellite internet has taken so long, because the plans typically get near some of the frequencies that old maritime GPS devices use and they can't be interrupted.
  - jjeaff 7y ago
    Just because their 5g tech is the best in no way prices they didn't steal ip to get where they are. I am not expert on networking equipment by any means. But I would assume that 5g equipment is built upon previous technology. It would thus follow that stealing the preceding, underlying technology and then focusing resources on building out the 5g part of the tech would be the fastest/cheapest way to become a leader in 5g.
  - 7y ago

vageli 7y ago

"Just" chips? The amount of research and development that goes into designing and fabricating chips used for wireless radio technologies is not so easily written off with a "just".

beaner 7y ago
I was hoping I could get away with an honest simple question without having to qualify all the assumptions and naïvities in it.
- vageli 7y ago
  I mean, aren't chips just electrons, protons and neutrons? :) More seriously, the 5g spec is a complicated and long document. Implementing 5g functionality in silicon is not a weekend project and implementations tend to be protected by NDAs and kept as trade secrets, etc. Ultimately the rationale is that development of these technologies is a complex, non-open-source, and costly endeavor. The nuances of _why_ this is the status quo are more human than technical in nature.