Germany’s Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure said it will provide 300 million euros ($344 million) in funding to develop and test Open RAN (O-RAN) technology in the country.
In a release, the ministry said its aim is to advance the development and testing of O-RAN network technology in Germany and to support the establishment of its own, independent manufacturing industry.
The first projects funded by the German government are a test lab set to run until 2024, testbed city rollouts in Neubrandenburg and Plauen, and a wider research scheme aimed at stimulating an ecosystem of compatible components. The lab is scheduled to receive 17 million euros, the cities around 11.5 million euros and the research project 2.5 million euros.
“The Open RAN Lab sponsored by us is an open platform that enables the networking of market players and accelerates technical development. All interested market participants have access and can work together across the board and learn from each other – regardless of whether they are network operators, network suppliers, or new players such as startups or SMEs,” said Germany’s Minister for Transport and Digital Infrastructure Andreas Scheuer.
“In the Open RAN Cities sponsored by us, the application is already going live. The project partners are setting up test fields in Neubrandenburg and Plauen for this purpose. This enables network operators to gain experience at an early stage in order to make the cellular network in Germany more efficient and to accelerate the transition to new cellular standards,” the official said.
The aim of the lab is to accelerate the development of new products, processes and services and to advance industrial research. The project consortium aims to support cooperative development with an open source strategy. For example, technical market solutions that are as uniform as possible should be developed through interdisciplinary cooperation. In the Open Lab , SMEs and startups have direct access to current research, The ministry said that the beneficiaries of this project are Deutsche Telekom, which will act as the consortium leader, Altran Germany SAS / Capgemini Engineering, BISDN GmbH , EANTC AG , Fraunhofer-Heinrich Hertz Institute, highstreet technologies GmbH , Nokia, Telefónica and TU Berlin.
In the so-called “Protopolis” Project, the ministry said that German telco Vodafone will research and test the integration of Open RAN components into the existing cellular network under real conditions.
Also, Deutsche Telekom plans to set up Neubrandenburg as a pilot city for Open RAN. The aim is to research Open RAN in real operation with German and European manufacturer participation and to identify possible weak points in Open RAN -based networks as well as hardware and software components in real operation.
Nokia is also planning to set up a test center for Open RAN under real conditions at the company location in Ulm. This O- RAN test environment will be used to ensure the interoperability of products and solutions to explore multiple vendors and testing.
In a separate statement, Deutsche Telekom said it would lead a consortium running the O-RAN lab, known as i14y. The i14y Lab Berlin will be the central location and core node of satellite locations such as Düsseldorf and Munich, the telco said.
“The interoperability and integration tests to be carried out may take the form of multi-vendor events such as the plugfest organized by the O-RAN Alliance and Telecom Infra Project. Such events, in the early stages of technology development, are the best method to bring vendors together for the first time and allow them to interact with the greatest possible freedom,” Deutsche Telekom said.
