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Europe’s telcos want ‘open’ 5G networks

jpfr 6y ago
Fabrice Bellard, who is quite famous on HN for his open source work, has founded a company for his own 5G implementation. And they are EU-based. [1] I'm under the impression his work is closer to the "radio protocol" than the infrastructure management behind. Not sure if they are related to Open-RAN though... [1] https://www.amarisoft.com/about-us/ https://www.amarisoft.com/about-us/
- wyldfire 6y ago
  > Amarisoft LTE and NR network software suit is a unique full software LTE and NR solution ... Our binary licenses can be fixed and bounded to a single hardware, floating on a USB dongle, or floating using a license server. I suppose it's possible that their product includes some Open Source Software, while still using node-locked licenses. But it doesn't sound like it. This press release [1] from 2020 makes it sound like Amarisoft is working on OpenRAN. [1] https://apnews.com/press-release/pr-businesswire/56f3c23c33af4880a7202a8dc22d5220 https://apnews.com/press-release/pr-businesswire/56f3c23c33a...
- technofiend 6y ago
  From reading HN it seems like there needs to be open source radio hardware as well to break the dependency on qualcomm, broadcom and whomever else is supplying chips. At least if the idea is to have something auditable.
  - user3939382 6y ago
    From what I understand (someone correct me if I'm wrong) part of the problem is that baseband hardware and firmware requires expensive FCC approvals that's more compatible with the profitability of closed-source intellectual property.
    - vaduz 6y ago
      It's not so much that it is more aligned with profitability per se, but the fact that each modification you put in the part of the device controlling the radio also needs said approval before being used to transmit - and FCC has been tightening the enforcement of that. It has been on HN before [0]... Usual caveats about Part 15 vs Part 97 use apply. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11267443 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11267443
    - fit2rule 6y ago
      We all need to be making RONJA a thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RONJA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RONJA
- ferdek 6y ago
  Recently Nokia strongly communicates its commitment to Open-RAN. They want to be like Tesla or Toyota (in case of hybrid-drives): so good that competition is unable to keep up even after opening their patents. Once telcos grasp the benfits of open-interfaces infrastructure (eCPRI and stuff), there is no coming back to closed ecosystems. The "radio protocol" is "open" since GSM, anyone can download standards from 3GPP and implement it accordingly. But the mere amount of knowledge and specialized hardware required to do this, even for single layer like L1, is tremendous. I think this is the real reason why we don't already have open-source implementation of the full stack. EDIT: an afterthought - maybe the O-RAN is really a chance for open-source here. In the future, once O-RAN is accepted and widely deployed, we could work on implementing the stack piece-by-piece, layer-by-layer, filling the gaps with commercial software/hardware as we go, instead of doing everything at once...
  - deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  - mytailorisrich 6y ago
    The 3GPP standard leaves a lot of implementation freedom in many areas and there is a huge number of patents on everything. So in practice licensing is a big issue and keeps new entrants at bay. Nokia thinks it is in good shape because without Huawei there is indeed not many threats. Starting from scratch is hugely costly and takes many years. In any case Nokia has no choice but to be "committed" to Open RAN since that's what telcos want. IMHO, Open RAN is a push by telcos to commoditize the infrastructure and to avoid being locked in because key interfaces are proprietary.
    - pcdoodle 6y ago
      WSB on reddit is pumping it now too. Makes sense.
    - g_p 6y ago
      In the UK where Huawei is on a phase-out, Open RAN is a bet by operators to ensure that they have more than 2 vendor options. They are required right now to use 2 vendors, so they are not solely reliant on any one company for their equipment. Most operators used 2 radio vendors, in order to keep things competitive when buying more. All have exposure to Huawei to some extent in their networks. If there are only 2 permitted credible radio vendors, then pricing on the "new" second vendor is hardly going to be competitive - where else will you go? You can't go with one vendor, and if you did, their pricing would be ramping up as well, as they know you only have one other choice. Open RAN presents an interesting insurance policy for operators, and Vodafone UK has even announced it will build a couple of thousand sites using less prominent vendors' equipment. This will get them better pricing going forwards from their existing vendors (as there's an onboarded alternative supplier), as well as give them a new option they might wind up preferring. Right now though, with the proprietary nature of X2 (in the real world - the standards suggest it's not proprietary, but it absolutely is proprietary), you can't deploy interoperable radios, and that keeps your vendor choice limited. If operators can run a procurement and buy a box from one of five companies, that feels a lot better for their shareholders.
- amelius 6y ago
  Do we really need control over the radio hardware? Or can we treat them as dumb pipes, and use something like Tor to shield us from whoever can track who is using a radio channel?
  - xorcist 6y ago
    Tor can not prevent a denial of service.
  - gcblkjaidfj 6y ago
    I'm dealing with intel AX200 chipsets (deployed to hundreds of sites only to find out they do not follow intel's own specification for PCIe (it's a 1X board that fails on any socket >1X) and that chipset handles a lot. From AP/Frequency/Channel negotiation one would expect, all the way to WPA3 which one would think to be on the software side, specially because we should trust OS kernel/drivers updates for generics such as WPA to be updated and validated faster than closed source firmware blobs. Now, I do not know if that is truly done on the firmware or the closed source drivers, because well, the drivers are closed source. But after you accept one binary blob, you might as well threat it all as integral part of the hardware. Who cares where it runs? i'm getting off topic :) but that is one tiny aspect of a consumer device. One would think that the routing/DPI/etc aspects of 5G hardware for tel Co to be an amplified version of that.
- steeve 6y ago
  I came exactly to promote this. Thank you.
- frequent 6y ago
  Amarisoft and Nexedi also launched a joint company called Rapid.Space last year. It combines cloud and 4G/5G infrastructure operation and is "HyperOpen" = using open-source software, open hardware and open service. Press release: https://handbook.rapid.space/RS-Hyper.Open.Converged.Cloud.Debut https://handbook.rapid.space/RS-Hyper.Open.Converged.Cloud.D... More info on 5G technology: https://handbook.rapid.space/evangelist/RS-Presentation.For.5G.Sovereignty https://handbook.rapid.space/evangelist/RS-Presentation.For.... (disclaimer: I work for Nexedi and help out on Rapid.Space)
  - john2010 6y ago
    as an open source fan I really like your Nexedi products. I find that https://nayuos.nexedi.com/#install-the-image-on-your-chromebook https://nayuos.nexedi.com/#install-the-image-on-your-chromeb... is missing. I work at a regional govt in Germany - we want to transition to local cloud - and think this is great product. If these 'NayuOS" can by synced to our own nextCloud installations. Could you help? Thnx
eivarv 6y ago
It'll probably never happen, but we should look into solving the technical debt in our communications infrastructure – even if breaking backward-compatibility . Huge issues and vulnerabilities wrt security and privacy that are probably solvable, but were never considered in the first place.
- g_p 6y ago
  I think there's a growing acceptance that SS7 is a protocol from the past. It's based on a set of assumptions (around telecoms operators being trustworthy) that just never held true. The problem is that it continues to be the lowest common denominator for a lot of the world to stay connected from a telecoms perspective. Moving to newer protocols makes a lot of sense, but for much of the developing world I imagine they'll continue to rely on legacy technologies like SS7 for some time to come, as they have that hardware in place etc. The driver away from legacy equipment in the West will likely be the skills shortage as engineers retire and there's a need to move to newer equipment that can be maintained and understood. There's enough of a shortage of new talent, let alone new talent that understands the old telecoms world way of thinking.
  - mschuster91 6y ago
    > The problem is that it continues to be the lowest common denominator for a lot of the world to stay connected from a telecoms perspective. Not just the developing world. The amount of money needed to rebuild our current telco grids with modern, designed from scratch infrastructure is in the hundreds of billions of euros range - in a time where money is short in supply. Personally, I believe that even in 2030 there will still be widespread 2G networks as "last fallback" for generations-old IoT devices that simply can't do anything else...
    - varispeed 6y ago
      Do you think that bandwidth heavy apps and sites should chip in? If we didn't use so much bandwidth we could easily stay with 3G? So it seems like because companies built these video sites and now everyone wants to have access to them in their pocket, why should telecom companies invest in it?
zoobab 6y ago
$ apt install 5g $ echo "Done"
naringas 6y ago
when they don't stand to make a profit because they own the "IP" then they want openess
shimonabi 6y ago
It's a protectionist scheme against foreign competition. Don't fall for the talk of "openness". Remember that the EU itself was established as a German-French cartel.
- burtness 6y ago
  *German-French-British
  - acta_non_verba 6y ago
    The UK was not a founding member of the European community. Charles de Gaulle saw to that.
    - kitd 6y ago
      They were however one of the main driving forces behind the Single Market, of which this is an expression.
  - gostsamo 6y ago
    The UK never bought the EU project, came late, left promptly. Know before talking.
    - ClumsyPilot 6y ago
      Alternatively: Came late, when realised they were missing out, got special treatment,stayed for 30 years, made a mess, threatened to divorse, it's been 5 years and they still can't shut the door.
    - Lio 6y ago
      The UK started efforts to join the EEC just 4 years after the Treaty of Rome. Its entry was personally blocked 3 times by Charles De Gaulle before finally being allowed to join in 1973. When the UK finally left in 2020 it had been a member for 47 years. I wouldn't describe that as coming late and leaving promptly. As for never buying the EU project, a 1975 referendum on EEC membership was won by a comfortable 34.4% majority. Where as the 2016 vote leave campaigns won with just a 3.7% majority, having broken the rules on spending. I would say that many of us in the UK buy the EU project and are unhappy about the leave result still. To this day the reports on foreign interference have not been compiled or fully published by the current Conservative government.
u678u 6y ago
Telephone networks are a dead business. You look at European telecom stocks and they just keep going down year after year. Wont be long before they're all bankrupts and will get nationalized again.
- monopoledance 6y ago
  Fingers crossed.
- tpmx 6y ago
  Sort of like the airlines. The high level of competition is good for the consumers, of course.
- ClumsyPilot 6y ago
  Providing affordabke reliable service is bad for business?
  - joejerryronnie 6y ago
    Yes, if there is no future growth in the market. Companies need to figure out how to expand their total addressable market or enter new lines of business.
    - ta2987 6y ago
      Why?
    - tjohns 6y ago
      I'm not sure this follows. There's plenty of business that are sustainable with flat growth. Especially utilities once they reach market saturation. Just as a quick example, the supermarket down the street from me is neither expanding their market or entering a new line of business. There is no risk of a Walmart opening next door given the location. They just seem to be doing just fine selling the groceries people need each week. Yes, sometimes market conditions change, and the companies need to react. Maybe people prefer buying avocados instead of carrots this season, and they need to adjust their stock. But outside that, there's no need for them to radically expand to stay sustainable.
est 6y ago
Yes! Make 5g v2x mesh happen, make devices cheap enough then we can have uncensorable Internet.
- zoobab 6y ago
  Governments do not understand the economics behind internet connectivity, they are just treating it as a way to make money, for example selling spectrum licenses to the highest bidder.
waheoo 6y ago
Is this a follow on from the Belgian 5g deal with Nokia? [1] Pretty huge shift in the wholesale market dynamics if this is whats happening here. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/orange-nokia-security-5g/huawei-ousted-from-heart-of-eu-as-nokia-wins-belgian-5g-contracts-idINKBN26U0J2 https://www.reuters.com/article/orange-nokia-security-5g/hua...
bhaavan 6y ago
Reliance Jio, a major player in India, is working on a OpenRAN based solution too [1]. Airtel, one of it's rivals is considering a similar approach , potentially joining in the efforts. [1] https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/for-home-grown-5g-rjio-bets-on-free-platform-open-ran/article32105779.ece https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/for-home-grow...
throw7 6y ago
"U.S. Congress in November passed a bill approving $750 billion in public funding to develop Open RAN technologies." My jaw dropped here when reading... but it's million, not billion.
- giancarlostoro 6y ago
  I see, I was wondering why you said that, indeed the linked article[0] says million, this article typod. Yeah nearly a trillion dollars for any technology invested on in one swoop would be quite jaw dropping (this comment may not age well if inflation makes trillion the new billion). [0]: https://www.rcrwireless.com/20201118/policy/house-unanimously-passes-750-million-open-ran-5g-bill https://www.rcrwireless.com/20201118/policy/house-unanimousl...
- ferdek 6y ago
  In addition this article is also strongly opinionated, charged with emotions, feels like stitched together without second reading IMHO. Like: > It would allow operators to procure [...] with different players to piece together a 5G network, breaking the market power of “end-to-end” vendors like Ericsson and Nokia. And later: > the O-RAN Alliance. It's a standard-setting body that includes [...] leading vendors Ericsson and Nokia. First, it doesn't work like that. They will still offer end-to-end deals, even with ORAN, it's just that winning conditions change. Second, why would companies support standardization effort that is supposedly intended to "harm" them? :D > The operators, now barred by governments from using Huawei in several European markets, see Open RAN as a fix to what they consider a duopoly in the vendor market that allows Ericsson and Nokia to charge higher prices for 5G equipment. I LOL'ed. From what I know, Ericsson and Nokia does not charge higher prices for 5G equipment due to duopoly, because that would be called price collusion and the journalists don't have proof to back it up. Also, Ericsson and Nokia are fighting each other for every piece of market share, I don't see how pumping up the prices would help here.
  - heimatau 6y ago
    > Second, why would companies support standardization effort that is supposedly intended to "harm" them? :D IMHO because decent regulations say so. AT&T has to comply with splitting up but did AT&T go extinct? Even though the situation isn't explicitly the same, the concept that government regulations are changing the market and it's direct effects are fairly similar. In the case above, Ericsson and Nokia are players that the government want to see exist in the market but for this specific aspect of the industry, they want to see a reduced role. IMHO, it's government trying to work better on a very important topic (for the nation, for the people, and for the global market place [more competition for Huawei).
LatteLazy 6y ago
No one ever actually found any technical issues with Huawei kit did they?
- baskire 6y ago
  Doesn’t matter. See Australia. The CCP would gladly withhold teleco infra gear or back door in an update to suit their needs. Sure USA might do the same. But the USA is aligned closer culturally and values wise to the rest of the west
- joejerryronnie 6y ago
  Does it matter if they did? At this point, everyone has to assume the CCP has the ability to take complete control of any Chinese company it wants to (see Ant Group). I’m not sure why they even bother with the “monopoly” or “corruption” pretenses at this point.
  - LatteLazy 6y ago
    That's fine, but then you have to assume the same of the CIA and 101 other countries/agencies. So you have to design and build every part of all your systems nationally down to the copper wire pretty much and only after you've vetted all the people involved. Just so your 5G system can't be turned off?
    - joejerryronnie 6y ago
      While it’s true that various US and foreign agencies can (and already are) tap into communication networks, that is a very different scenario than what you see in China, i.e. the state essentially taking control of private companies whenever they want.
      - LatteLazy 6y ago
        I don't see why? We know the US used the NSA to gain an economic edge in negotiations with the EU. It even shared the information commercially didn't it? I don't think the US would hesitate to interfere for a moment if it wanted. The EU is already under US sanctions for building a gas pipeline with Russia. There is the Iran situation and the wider Middle East and North Africa messes and Turkey. Plenty of places for a disagreement to form... The EU has no major beef with China (I would prefer if they did, there is a lot to oppose about the PRC). China also has a much more isolationist/localist foreign policy so they're less likely to act and less likely to come into conflict with the EU. Edit: Source on spying: https://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/30/world/europe/eu-nsa/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/30/world/europe/eu-nsa/index... https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/business/us-snooping-on-companies-cited-by-china.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/business/us-snooping-on-c... On sanctions: https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-countries-protest-us-sanctions-say-german-officials/ https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-countries-protest-us-sanc...
crispycrafter2 6y ago
Hahaha.. Force the hand of those who feed and we'll force the hand of the fed. The West has blocked Huawei from being used now they force the populis to demand open networks.
knorker 6y ago
So I'll finally be able to run OpenGGSN in production?!
- signa11 6y ago
  if you are not doing lte then probably yes, otherwise you should stick with pgw etc
maeln 6y ago
Note: This is being pushed by the major telecom company in the EU > The Continent's "big four" telcos Deutsche Telekom, Telefónica, Vodafone and Orange on Wednesday published a joint "memorandum of understanding" pledging to prioritize the development of "Open RAN" technology They want to have more interoperabilities between equipment and more supplier basically : > Open RAN encompasses the idea of chopping up the 5G supply chain into smaller pieces and imposing standards on equipment and software firms so their products can work together This makes a lot of sense for telco since it would drastically lower the cost of their deployment and the maintenance of the 5G network. Right now, if you take your equipments from one supplier, you are basically locked-in with this supplier since they are not compatible with each-other. So if one equipment fail, you need to buy a replacement from the same supplier.
- tguvot 6y ago
  >This makes a lot of sense for telco since it would drastically lower the cost of their deployment and the maintenance of the 5G network. Actually no. Integrated solutions are cheaper to make at scale (for how much it's sold it's a different question) Also integration of multiple vendors into one working solutions has additional costs both for deployment and maintenance/support later (instead of 1 piece of equipment you have 5 boxes with 5 vendors pointing fingers at each other when something fails). Also more points of failure
afrojack123 6y ago
doofus
abledon 6y ago
this alongside WSB's recent interest in NOK... lets see what happens.
nickdothutton 6y ago
For those of you interested in a little of the history leading up to this point, particularly from a European perspective, you might find this of interest from me, written in 2019. A number of events lead up to our present dilemma. https://blog.eutopian.io/huawei-5g/ https://blog.eutopian.io/huawei-5g/
deleted 6y ago
[deleted]

jpfr 6y ago

Fabrice Bellard, who is quite famous on HN for his open source work, has founded a company for his own 5G implementation. And they are EU-based. [1] I'm under the impression his work is closer to the "radio protocol" than the infrastructure management behind. Not sure if they are related to Open-RAN though... [1] https://www.amarisoft.com/about-us/ https://www.amarisoft.com/about-us/

wyldfire 6y ago
> Amarisoft LTE and NR network software suit is a unique full software LTE and NR solution ... Our binary licenses can be fixed and bounded to a single hardware, floating on a USB dongle, or floating using a license server. I suppose it's possible that their product includes some Open Source Software, while still using node-locked licenses. But it doesn't sound like it. This press release [1] from 2020 makes it sound like Amarisoft is working on OpenRAN. [1] https://apnews.com/press-release/pr-businesswire/56f3c23c33af4880a7202a8dc22d5220 https://apnews.com/press-release/pr-businesswire/56f3c23c33a...
technofiend 6y ago
From reading HN it seems like there needs to be open source radio hardware as well to break the dependency on qualcomm, broadcom and whomever else is supplying chips. At least if the idea is to have something auditable.
- user3939382 6y ago
  From what I understand (someone correct me if I'm wrong) part of the problem is that baseband hardware and firmware requires expensive FCC approvals that's more compatible with the profitability of closed-source intellectual property.
  - vaduz 6y ago
    It's not so much that it is more aligned with profitability per se, but the fact that each modification you put in the part of the device controlling the radio also needs said approval before being used to transmit - and FCC has been tightening the enforcement of that. It has been on HN before [0]... Usual caveats about Part 15 vs Part 97 use apply. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11267443 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11267443
  - fit2rule 6y ago
    We all need to be making RONJA a thing: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RONJA https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RONJA
ferdek 6y ago
Recently Nokia strongly communicates its commitment to Open-RAN. They want to be like Tesla or Toyota (in case of hybrid-drives): so good that competition is unable to keep up even after opening their patents. Once telcos grasp the benfits of open-interfaces infrastructure (eCPRI and stuff), there is no coming back to closed ecosystems. The "radio protocol" is "open" since GSM, anyone can download standards from 3GPP and implement it accordingly. But the mere amount of knowledge and specialized hardware required to do this, even for single layer like L1, is tremendous. I think this is the real reason why we don't already have open-source implementation of the full stack. EDIT: an afterthought - maybe the O-RAN is really a chance for open-source here. In the future, once O-RAN is accepted and widely deployed, we could work on implementing the stack piece-by-piece, layer-by-layer, filling the gaps with commercial software/hardware as we go, instead of doing everything at once...
- deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
- mytailorisrich 6y ago
  The 3GPP standard leaves a lot of implementation freedom in many areas and there is a huge number of patents on everything. So in practice licensing is a big issue and keeps new entrants at bay. Nokia thinks it is in good shape because without Huawei there is indeed not many threats. Starting from scratch is hugely costly and takes many years. In any case Nokia has no choice but to be "committed" to Open RAN since that's what telcos want. IMHO, Open RAN is a push by telcos to commoditize the infrastructure and to avoid being locked in because key interfaces are proprietary.
  - pcdoodle 6y ago
    WSB on reddit is pumping it now too. Makes sense.
  - g_p 6y ago
    In the UK where Huawei is on a phase-out, Open RAN is a bet by operators to ensure that they have more than 2 vendor options. They are required right now to use 2 vendors, so they are not solely reliant on any one company for their equipment. Most operators used 2 radio vendors, in order to keep things competitive when buying more. All have exposure to Huawei to some extent in their networks. If there are only 2 permitted credible radio vendors, then pricing on the "new" second vendor is hardly going to be competitive - where else will you go? You can't go with one vendor, and if you did, their pricing would be ramping up as well, as they know you only have one other choice. Open RAN presents an interesting insurance policy for operators, and Vodafone UK has even announced it will build a couple of thousand sites using less prominent vendors' equipment. This will get them better pricing going forwards from their existing vendors (as there's an onboarded alternative supplier), as well as give them a new option they might wind up preferring. Right now though, with the proprietary nature of X2 (in the real world - the standards suggest it's not proprietary, but it absolutely is proprietary), you can't deploy interoperable radios, and that keeps your vendor choice limited. If operators can run a procurement and buy a box from one of five companies, that feels a lot better for their shareholders.
amelius 6y ago
Do we really need control over the radio hardware? Or can we treat them as dumb pipes, and use something like Tor to shield us from whoever can track who is using a radio channel?
- xorcist 6y ago
  Tor can not prevent a denial of service.
- gcblkjaidfj 6y ago
  I'm dealing with intel AX200 chipsets (deployed to hundreds of sites only to find out they do not follow intel's own specification for PCIe (it's a 1X board that fails on any socket >1X) and that chipset handles a lot. From AP/Frequency/Channel negotiation one would expect, all the way to WPA3 which one would think to be on the software side, specially because we should trust OS kernel/drivers updates for generics such as WPA to be updated and validated faster than closed source firmware blobs. Now, I do not know if that is truly done on the firmware or the closed source drivers, because well, the drivers are closed source. But after you accept one binary blob, you might as well threat it all as integral part of the hardware. Who cares where it runs? i'm getting off topic :) but that is one tiny aspect of a consumer device. One would think that the routing/DPI/etc aspects of 5G hardware for tel Co to be an amplified version of that.
steeve 6y ago
I came exactly to promote this. Thank you.
frequent 6y ago
Amarisoft and Nexedi also launched a joint company called Rapid.Space last year. It combines cloud and 4G/5G infrastructure operation and is "HyperOpen" = using open-source software, open hardware and open service. Press release: https://handbook.rapid.space/RS-Hyper.Open.Converged.Cloud.Debut https://handbook.rapid.space/RS-Hyper.Open.Converged.Cloud.D... More info on 5G technology: https://handbook.rapid.space/evangelist/RS-Presentation.For.5G.Sovereignty https://handbook.rapid.space/evangelist/RS-Presentation.For.... (disclaimer: I work for Nexedi and help out on Rapid.Space)
- john2010 6y ago
  as an open source fan I really like your Nexedi products. I find that https://nayuos.nexedi.com/#install-the-image-on-your-chromebook https://nayuos.nexedi.com/#install-the-image-on-your-chromeb... is missing. I work at a regional govt in Germany - we want to transition to local cloud - and think this is great product. If these 'NayuOS" can by synced to our own nextCloud installations. Could you help? Thnx

eivarv 6y ago

It'll probably never happen, but we should look into solving the technical debt in our communications infrastructure – even if breaking backward-compatibility . Huge issues and vulnerabilities wrt security and privacy that are probably solvable, but were never considered in the first place.

g_p 6y ago
I think there's a growing acceptance that SS7 is a protocol from the past. It's based on a set of assumptions (around telecoms operators being trustworthy) that just never held true. The problem is that it continues to be the lowest common denominator for a lot of the world to stay connected from a telecoms perspective. Moving to newer protocols makes a lot of sense, but for much of the developing world I imagine they'll continue to rely on legacy technologies like SS7 for some time to come, as they have that hardware in place etc. The driver away from legacy equipment in the West will likely be the skills shortage as engineers retire and there's a need to move to newer equipment that can be maintained and understood. There's enough of a shortage of new talent, let alone new talent that understands the old telecoms world way of thinking.
- mschuster91 6y ago
  > The problem is that it continues to be the lowest common denominator for a lot of the world to stay connected from a telecoms perspective. Not just the developing world. The amount of money needed to rebuild our current telco grids with modern, designed from scratch infrastructure is in the hundreds of billions of euros range - in a time where money is short in supply. Personally, I believe that even in 2030 there will still be widespread 2G networks as "last fallback" for generations-old IoT devices that simply can't do anything else...
  - varispeed 6y ago
    Do you think that bandwidth heavy apps and sites should chip in? If we didn't use so much bandwidth we could easily stay with 3G? So it seems like because companies built these video sites and now everyone wants to have access to them in their pocket, why should telecom companies invest in it?

zoobab 6y ago

$ apt install 5g $ echo "Done"

naringas 6y ago

when they don't stand to make a profit because they own the "IP" then they want openess

shimonabi 6y ago

It's a protectionist scheme against foreign competition. Don't fall for the talk of "openness". Remember that the EU itself was established as a German-French cartel.

burtness 6y ago
*German-French-British
- acta_non_verba 6y ago
  The UK was not a founding member of the European community. Charles de Gaulle saw to that.
  - kitd 6y ago
    They were however one of the main driving forces behind the Single Market, of which this is an expression.
- gostsamo 6y ago
  The UK never bought the EU project, came late, left promptly. Know before talking.
  - ClumsyPilot 6y ago
    Alternatively: Came late, when realised they were missing out, got special treatment,stayed for 30 years, made a mess, threatened to divorse, it's been 5 years and they still can't shut the door.
  - Lio 6y ago
    The UK started efforts to join the EEC just 4 years after the Treaty of Rome. Its entry was personally blocked 3 times by Charles De Gaulle before finally being allowed to join in 1973. When the UK finally left in 2020 it had been a member for 47 years. I wouldn't describe that as coming late and leaving promptly. As for never buying the EU project, a 1975 referendum on EEC membership was won by a comfortable 34.4% majority. Where as the 2016 vote leave campaigns won with just a 3.7% majority, having broken the rules on spending. I would say that many of us in the UK buy the EU project and are unhappy about the leave result still. To this day the reports on foreign interference have not been compiled or fully published by the current Conservative government.

u678u 6y ago

Telephone networks are a dead business. You look at European telecom stocks and they just keep going down year after year. Wont be long before they're all bankrupts and will get nationalized again.

monopoledance 6y ago
Fingers crossed.
tpmx 6y ago
Sort of like the airlines. The high level of competition is good for the consumers, of course.
ClumsyPilot 6y ago
Providing affordabke reliable service is bad for business?
- joejerryronnie 6y ago
  Yes, if there is no future growth in the market. Companies need to figure out how to expand their total addressable market or enter new lines of business.
  - ta2987 6y ago
    Why?
  - tjohns 6y ago
    I'm not sure this follows. There's plenty of business that are sustainable with flat growth. Especially utilities once they reach market saturation. Just as a quick example, the supermarket down the street from me is neither expanding their market or entering a new line of business. There is no risk of a Walmart opening next door given the location. They just seem to be doing just fine selling the groceries people need each week. Yes, sometimes market conditions change, and the companies need to react. Maybe people prefer buying avocados instead of carrots this season, and they need to adjust their stock. But outside that, there's no need for them to radically expand to stay sustainable.

est 6y ago

Yes! Make 5g v2x mesh happen, make devices cheap enough then we can have uncensorable Internet.

zoobab 6y ago
Governments do not understand the economics behind internet connectivity, they are just treating it as a way to make money, for example selling spectrum licenses to the highest bidder.

waheoo 6y ago

Is this a follow on from the Belgian 5g deal with Nokia? [1] Pretty huge shift in the wholesale market dynamics if this is whats happening here. [1] https://www.reuters.com/article/orange-nokia-security-5g/huawei-ousted-from-heart-of-eu-as-nokia-wins-belgian-5g-contracts-idINKBN26U0J2 https://www.reuters.com/article/orange-nokia-security-5g/hua...

bhaavan 6y ago

Reliance Jio, a major player in India, is working on a OpenRAN based solution too [1]. Airtel, one of it's rivals is considering a similar approach , potentially joining in the efforts. [1] https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/for-home-grown-5g-rjio-bets-on-free-platform-open-ran/article32105779.ece https://www.thehindubusinessline.com/info-tech/for-home-grow...

throw7 6y ago

"U.S. Congress in November passed a bill approving $750 billion in public funding to develop Open RAN technologies." My jaw dropped here when reading... but it's million, not billion.

giancarlostoro 6y ago
I see, I was wondering why you said that, indeed the linked article[0] says million, this article typod. Yeah nearly a trillion dollars for any technology invested on in one swoop would be quite jaw dropping (this comment may not age well if inflation makes trillion the new billion). [0]: https://www.rcrwireless.com/20201118/policy/house-unanimously-passes-750-million-open-ran-5g-bill https://www.rcrwireless.com/20201118/policy/house-unanimousl...
ferdek 6y ago
In addition this article is also strongly opinionated, charged with emotions, feels like stitched together without second reading IMHO. Like: > It would allow operators to procure [...] with different players to piece together a 5G network, breaking the market power of “end-to-end” vendors like Ericsson and Nokia. And later: > the O-RAN Alliance. It's a standard-setting body that includes [...] leading vendors Ericsson and Nokia. First, it doesn't work like that. They will still offer end-to-end deals, even with ORAN, it's just that winning conditions change. Second, why would companies support standardization effort that is supposedly intended to "harm" them? :D > The operators, now barred by governments from using Huawei in several European markets, see Open RAN as a fix to what they consider a duopoly in the vendor market that allows Ericsson and Nokia to charge higher prices for 5G equipment. I LOL'ed. From what I know, Ericsson and Nokia does not charge higher prices for 5G equipment due to duopoly, because that would be called price collusion and the journalists don't have proof to back it up. Also, Ericsson and Nokia are fighting each other for every piece of market share, I don't see how pumping up the prices would help here.
- heimatau 6y ago
  > Second, why would companies support standardization effort that is supposedly intended to "harm" them? :D IMHO because decent regulations say so. AT&T has to comply with splitting up but did AT&T go extinct? Even though the situation isn't explicitly the same, the concept that government regulations are changing the market and it's direct effects are fairly similar. In the case above, Ericsson and Nokia are players that the government want to see exist in the market but for this specific aspect of the industry, they want to see a reduced role. IMHO, it's government trying to work better on a very important topic (for the nation, for the people, and for the global market place [more competition for Huawei).

LatteLazy 6y ago

No one ever actually found any technical issues with Huawei kit did they?

baskire 6y ago
Doesn’t matter. See Australia. The CCP would gladly withhold teleco infra gear or back door in an update to suit their needs. Sure USA might do the same. But the USA is aligned closer culturally and values wise to the rest of the west
joejerryronnie 6y ago
Does it matter if they did? At this point, everyone has to assume the CCP has the ability to take complete control of any Chinese company it wants to (see Ant Group). I’m not sure why they even bother with the “monopoly” or “corruption” pretenses at this point.
- LatteLazy 6y ago
  That's fine, but then you have to assume the same of the CIA and 101 other countries/agencies. So you have to design and build every part of all your systems nationally down to the copper wire pretty much and only after you've vetted all the people involved. Just so your 5G system can't be turned off?
  - joejerryronnie 6y ago
    While it’s true that various US and foreign agencies can (and already are) tap into communication networks, that is a very different scenario than what you see in China, i.e. the state essentially taking control of private companies whenever they want.
    - LatteLazy 6y ago
      I don't see why? We know the US used the NSA to gain an economic edge in negotiations with the EU. It even shared the information commercially didn't it? I don't think the US would hesitate to interfere for a moment if it wanted. The EU is already under US sanctions for building a gas pipeline with Russia. There is the Iran situation and the wider Middle East and North Africa messes and Turkey. Plenty of places for a disagreement to form... The EU has no major beef with China (I would prefer if they did, there is a lot to oppose about the PRC). China also has a much more isolationist/localist foreign policy so they're less likely to act and less likely to come into conflict with the EU. Edit: Source on spying: https://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/30/world/europe/eu-nsa/index.html https://edition.cnn.com/2013/06/30/world/europe/eu-nsa/index... https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/business/us-snooping-on-companies-cited-by-china.html https://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/21/business/us-snooping-on-c... On sanctions: https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-countries-protest-us-sanctions-say-german-officials/ https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-countries-protest-us-sanc...

crispycrafter2 6y ago

Hahaha.. Force the hand of those who feed and we'll force the hand of the fed. The West has blocked Huawei from being used now they force the populis to demand open networks.

knorker 6y ago

So I'll finally be able to run OpenGGSN in production?!

signa11 6y ago
if you are not doing lte then probably yes, otherwise you should stick with pgw etc

maeln 6y ago

Note: This is being pushed by the major telecom company in the EU > The Continent's "big four" telcos Deutsche Telekom, Telefónica, Vodafone and Orange on Wednesday published a joint "memorandum of understanding" pledging to prioritize the development of "Open RAN" technology They want to have more interoperabilities between equipment and more supplier basically : > Open RAN encompasses the idea of chopping up the 5G supply chain into smaller pieces and imposing standards on equipment and software firms so their products can work together This makes a lot of sense for telco since it would drastically lower the cost of their deployment and the maintenance of the 5G network. Right now, if you take your equipments from one supplier, you are basically locked-in with this supplier since they are not compatible with each-other. So if one equipment fail, you need to buy a replacement from the same supplier.

tguvot 6y ago
>This makes a lot of sense for telco since it would drastically lower the cost of their deployment and the maintenance of the 5G network. Actually no. Integrated solutions are cheaper to make at scale (for how much it's sold it's a different question) Also integration of multiple vendors into one working solutions has additional costs both for deployment and maintenance/support later (instead of 1 piece of equipment you have 5 boxes with 5 vendors pointing fingers at each other when something fails). Also more points of failure

afrojack123 6y ago

doofus

abledon 6y ago

this alongside WSB's recent interest in NOK... lets see what happens.

nickdothutton 6y ago

For those of you interested in a little of the history leading up to this point, particularly from a European perspective, you might find this of interest from me, written in 2019. A number of events lead up to our present dilemma. https://blog.eutopian.io/huawei-5g/ https://blog.eutopian.io/huawei-5g/

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