Nokia and UAE-based telecommunications company du, part of Emirates Integrated Telecommunications Company (EITC), have announced the first commercial deployment of a 5G Cloud RAN solution in the Middle East and Africa. The 5G Cloud RAN site, located in Abu Dhabi, utilizes Nokia’s AirScale massive MIMO radios operating in the 3.6 GHz band and is based on Nokia’s anyRAN solution. This solution integrates virtualized distributed units (vDU) and centralized units (vCU) powered by Dell PowerEdge XR8620 servers.
Additionally, the platform is supported by Red Hat’s Kubernetes-powered hybrid cloud application platform, OpenShift, to enable cloud-native RAN functions across the network. By leveraging Red Hat OpenShift, du can scale its 5G network footprint more effectively and introduce new services, including AI, machine learning, and industry-specific applications for sectors like manufacturing, energy, and logistics.
“By adopting 5G Cloud RAN, we are not only enhancing the efficiency and flexibility of our network, but we are also unlocking new opportunities and services that will provide significant value to our customers and society,” said Saleem Alblooshi, CTO of du.
