O-RAN ALLIANCE Announces MoU with OAI, New OTICs, O-RAN Release 3, New Specifications and Spring PlugFest

Memorandum of Understanding between O-RAN ALLIANCE and OpenAirInterface Software Alliance (OAI)

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In recently signed Memorandum of Understanding, OAI and O-RAN ALLIANCE agreed to co-operate on open Radio Access Network issues, open source software development, and 5G as well as next generation platforms for demonstrating O-RAN technology. Both organizations will encourage sharing of information in areas of mutual interest and may hold joint meetings and workshops.

”I am very pleased to see the excellent cooperation between O-RAN and OAI,” said Alex Jinsung Choi, Chair of the Board of O-RAN ALLIANCE and SVP Group Technology, Deutsche Telekom. “The MoU will strengthen our cooperation in development of open source software for the RAN. It will allow a more focused cooperation between both organizations and will enhance our software development.”

“We are very excited at the signing of this MoU,” said Raymond Knopp, President of the OpenAirInterface Software Alliance. “This has been a long standing goal for the OpenAirInterface Software Alliance. Firstly, the OAI software follows the O-RAN architecture and paves the way for showcasing the next generation cellular wireless technologies. Secondly, the two organizations are very complementary in their value propositions. We look forward to capitalizing on this collaboration in the future.”

Two New Open Testing and Integration Centres (OTIC) Approved in Asia & Pacific

O-RAN ALLIANCE announces that Asia & Pacific OTIC by ritt7layers and Asia & Pacific OTIC in Singapore have joined the community of Open Testing and Integration Centres. With this addition there are now 11 approved OTICs across Europe, the Americas, and Asia.

OTICs are vendor-independent, open, and qualified labs approved by the O-RAN ALLIANCE that issue awards in the O-RAN Certification and Badging Program.

For more information about OTICs and O-RAN ALLIANCE’s testing and integration work please visit our website.

O-RAN Release 3 Implements Features with 58 New or Updated Technical Documents

O-RAN Release 003 includes enhancements to RAN Slicing and SMO features. It also introduces new features:

• Security requirements and countermeasures for RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC) interfaces and apps, O-Cloud and O2 interface
• Security technical reports with threat and risk analysis outputs for application lifecycle management, log management, service management and orchestration, shared O-RU
• RIC-enabled massive MIMO optimization for non-Grid of Beams (GoB) beamforming method
• RAN Analytics Information Exposure (RAIE) use cases and RIC architecture enhancements for extending RAN-aware optimization capabilities to external services and applications

O-RAN Release 003 also includes 10 new specification titles:

• Network Energy Savings Use Cases Technical Report
• Decoupled SMO Architecture Technical Report
• Application Protocols for R1 Services
• O1 Interface Specification for Near-RT RIC
• Near-RT RIC APIs specification
• Requirements and Reference Design Specification for Enterprise Microcell
• Study on Security for Application Lifecycle Management
• Study on Security Log Management
• Study on Security for Service Management and Orchestration (SMO)
• Study on Security for Shared O-RU

For more details about newly released O-RAN specifications please read our web announcement. All O-RAN specifications are available for download at our website.

O-RAN Global PlugFest Spring 2023 Set to Start at Labs Across Asia, Europe, and North America

The first of the two O-RAN Global PlugFests planned for 2023 will be held in:

• South Korea hosted by KT
• Taiwan hosted by Auray Technology
• Europe hosted by Deutsche Telekom, EANTC, EURECOM, Orange, Telefónica and Vodafone
• USA hosted by University of New Hampshire InterOperability Laboratory

More than 55 companies have indicated their plan to participate.

Planned activities include interoperability and E2E testing, validation and demonstration of Radio Intelligent Controller (RIC) use cases, as well as X-haul transport, O-Cloud, QoS, and security testing.

F2F Meetings Boost Progress of O-RAN Technical Groups

With the easing of pandemic restrictions, O-RAN ALLIANCE resumed face-to-face meetings of its technical groups, greatly accelerating progress in specifications development. Latest F2F meetings took place in February 2023 in Prague with more than 430 delegates from 115 companies and institutions around the world. O-RAN plans to hold two more F2F meetings in 2023, one in June and one in October.

About O-RAN ALLIANCE

The O-RAN ALLIANCE is a world-wide community of more than 300 mobile operators, vendors, and research & academic institutions operating in the Radio Access Network (RAN) industry. As the RAN is an essential part of any mobile network, the O-RAN ALLIANCE’s mission is to re-shape the industry towards more intelligent, open, virtualized and fully interoperable mobile networks. The new O-RAN specifications enable a more competitive and vibrant RAN supplier ecosystem with faster innovation to improve user experience. O-RAN based mobile networks at the same time improve the efficiency of RAN deployments as well as operations by mobile operators. To achieve this, the O-RAN ALLIANCE publishes new RAN specifications, releases open software for the RAN, and supports its members in integration and testing of their implementations.
For more information, please visit www.o-ran.org.

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Contact information

O-RAN ALLIANCE PR Contact

Zbynek Dalecky
pr@o-ran.org
O-RAN ALLIANCE e.V.
Buschkauler Weg 27
53347 Alfter/Germany