Mavenir and NTT Data have formed a strategic cooperation to develop products and services for private 5G and 4G networks in Austria, Germany and Switzerland, with plans to expand into other regions and markets.

Figure 1: Berlin by night: Mavenir's experience in German-speaking markets means the partnership will focus there. (Source: Stefan Widua on Unsplash)

The two partners plan to focus on a range of offerings including open radio network access (RAN), radio access, cloud core for data and voice, 5G, digital enablement platforms, and analytics and applications for enterprises and industry.

NTT Data also said it will provide its own 5G campus network to support the development of new services.

Sebastian Solbach, head of telecommunications at NTT DATA, said Mavenir was chosen thanks to the company's experience in virtualized core networks and open RAN – and existing relationships with "all German mobile providers."

Open doors
Mavenir is a strong proponent of and an emerging player in the open RAN ecosystem. In Germany, it recently validated trials with Deutsche Telekom on standalone 5G core network technology, for example.

The vendor is also working with Telefónica and Vodafone in various markets on trials of open RAN and virtualized network elements, such as the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS).

The selection of German-speaking markets also looks set to capitalize on opportunities there for private mobile networks.

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Germany's telecom regulator has decided to reserve 100MHz of 5G spectrum for industrial groups, saying many companies want to build their own networks to avoid using a telecom operator's public service.

The decision proved to be controversial, with operators like France's Orange slamming the move as bad news for smaller firms.

Orange senior vice president of radio networks Arnaud Vamparys said only very large companies, with the resources to build their own private networks, would benefit.

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— Anne Morris, contributing editor, special to Light Reading