Vodafone and Orange have made the first 4G calls in Romania over a shared pilot network, based on Open RAN

Vodafone and Orange have successfully run a pilot project involving the first real 4G calling experience on a group of shared sites, based on Open RAN technology, integrated into the commercial network, in a rural area near Bucharest. This technology milestone follows the two companies’ announcement in February this year that they will build an Open RAN with RAN sharing in rural areas of Europe where both companies have mobile networks.

Open RAN technology decouples software functionality from hardware. This allows remote upgrading of mobile base stations with new features and services, faster and more cost-effectively, reducing the need for site visits due to a higher level of network automation. In the context of RAN sharing, each operator manages its own virtualised RAN software on a shared cloud infrastructure, increasing autonomy and differentiation while sharing network operating costs.

As part of this commercial traffic pilot, Vodafone and Orange worked with key, individually selected partner providers to demonstrate the benefits of a virtualised radio access network based on standardised Open RAN interfaces, including the ability to make software changes remotely.

Building on Vodafone’s experience in deploying Open RAN in the UK and successful integration tests in Orange’s Open RAN lab in France, the companies used the same technology “stack” concept on their shared sites. This includes a virtualised commercial RAN solution from Samsung, overlaid on top of the Wind River software used to deploy and scale RAN software, as well as Dell PowerEdge servers.

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Following these successfully tested 4G calls to Open RAN shared sites in a rural location, Vodafone and Orange will soon introduce 2G technology, already tested and validated in the lab, and later 5G. It will be the first time in Europe that 2G radio software is fully integrated into a virtualised Open RAN environment, simplifying deployment while avoiding the need for more operationally complex solutions.

Alberto Ripepi, Chief Network Officer at Vodafone, said: “Together with Orange, we have developed a model that will serve as a reference for extending mobile networks to rural communities in Europe. Open RAN sharing will allow us to reduce costs by sharing hardware components, independently managing our own RAN software in the cloud to offer differentiated services to our customers.”

Bruno Zerbib, Chief Technology & Innovation Officer at Orange, said, “This first pilot deployment of Open RAN at Orange is an important milestone to demonstrate that Open RAN is now a mature technology, ready to be rolled out over existing networks. It sets the stage for larger scale deployments across the group and paves the way for fully automated and intelligent networks.”

Open RAN offers significant advantages over traditional network sharing. By using an open, virtualised radio access network and relying on disaggregated software and hardware, Vodafone and Orange will each have greater flexibility when adding new radio sites or upgrading existing ones, while keeping energy consumption and costs low. Finally, it will allow operators to run different software containers on the same hardware, providing operational differentiation and independence.

The project reinforces each company’s commitment to deploy Open RAN as the technology of choice for future mobile networks in Europe, leading to a more resilient and flexible supply chain. The companies’ commitment to Open RAN is also in line with the European Commission’s ambitious goal of having 5G in all populated areas by 2030.