SHENZHEN – ZTE Corporation, a major international provider of telecommunications, and enterprise and consumer technology solutions for the Mobile Internet, today announced that it has extended its collaboration with Red Hat, the world's leading provider of open source solutions, in a bid to accelerate the deployment of 5G networks.

The collaboration includes a new reference architecture aimed at enabling telcos to more effectively deploy virtual network functions (VNFs) on Red Hat OpenStack Platform, Red Hat’s highly-scalable and agile Infrastructure-as-a-Service (IaaS) solution on ZTE’s hardware.

The collaboration combines the open source innovation available in Red Hat OpenStack Platform with ZTE’s Cloud Core Network components. It offers a replicable and cost-effective network solution that can speed integration time by 5 times based on internal Red Hat testing.

By using Red Hat OpenStack Platform for its VNF services, ZTE can better prepare service providers for 5G deployments by transforming traditional core data centers (DCs) into more agile, efficient and innovative open environments.

ZTE has completed the VNF certification of Red Hat OpenStack Platform 13 and plans to begin the certification for Red Hat OpenStack Platform 16 this year. ZTE also plans to provide the integrated environment for its VNF services with Red Hat OpenStack Platform in ZTE Cybersecurity Labs in Nanjing and Brussels, in order to showcase the new reference architecture. ZTE Cybersecurity Lab is a center for innovation, and a global resource for customers and partners who want to build NFV/SDN applications and solutions. It offers fully transparent policy allowing customers, regulatory entities and other interested third parties to perform independent security assessments and audits in equipment. The independent source code reviews, document review, black box testing and penetration testing allow customers to verify the security of ZTE’s products, services and processes. Moreover, as part of this collaboration, Red Hat and ZTE have worked with Vodafone Idea Limited, India’s leading telecom service provider, to deploy its VNF services on Red Hat OpenStack Platform to help deliver its Universal cloud platform.

ZTE