The Open RAN Alliance said that it has successfully concluded its fall 2023 plugfest. The event was co-hosted by 24 major operators, OTICs and independent institutions for testing, the organization said. It ran from September-November 2023 and was held in 16 labs around the world, in Asia, Europe and North America. Fifty-two companies and institutions participated, and O-RAN Alliance noted that many of them participated at more than one of the test venues. The fall plugfest not only focused on end-to-end and security testing, but included advanced testing of the RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC) as well as field trials.
Test vendors have been highlighting their role in enabling the plugfest events. Keysight Technologies said this week that its Keysight Open RAN Architect (KORA) solutions were used to conduct 20 integration test demonstrations of multi-vendor network functions with more than 25 collaborators in 10 labs located in 7 countries. Tests that Keysight supported focused on RIC interface conformance and functional testing, AI/ML model training for energy savings, and xApp-enabled use case testing.
In other test news:
–Rohde & Schwarz’s CMX500 radio communication tester was used to support certification of a 4G/5G-equipped drone from Nokia (pictured above). The 4G/5G drone in-a-box communications solution is aimed at business and mission-critical communications support, including providing reliable Beyond Visual Line of Sight (BVLOS) operation. According to Rohde & Schwarz, it is the first such offering to achieve Federal Communications Commission certification.
Nokia also uses Rohde & Schwartz’s QualiPoc 4.9G/LTE and 5G network measurement capabilities in its drone platform, for purposes of assessing network coverage and quality. The two companies extended their related cooperation to include device testing and certification; the CMX500 was utilized within Nokia Bell Labs’ Global Product and Compliance Laboratory for “extensive radiated and conducted emissions testing,” R&S said.
Thomas Eder, Nokia’s head of embedded wireless Solutions, said that the certification of the wireless-equipped drone “highlights the vital role that collaboration and diligent testing play in the 5G era. By meeting the FCC’s rigorous standards, we are shaping the path in the U.S. for industrial and public sector use cases, improved 5G spectrum monetization, and the nationwide roll-out of drones for BVLOS operations on 3GPP spectrum.”
–TÜV SÜD announced that it has officially opened its TÜV SÜD Bengaluru Campus, which spans across three acres and comprises 70,000 sq. feet in its first phase. The new integrated office, training center and laboratory facility will provide a testing facility a variety of testing, including electromagnetic compatibility, and products including various electronics and telecommunications equipment. The EMI/EMC and radio frequency testing facilities support testing up to 40 GHz and can also handle large products, with a 10-meter semi-anechoic chamber that has a six-meter turntable, according to the company.
–BAE Systems announced this week that it is the recipient of $35 million in initial funding from the federal CHIPS and Science Act that will help it to modernize its Microelectronics Center (MEC) in Nashua, New Hampshire, which the company said will help it to scale up production in order to meet demand from the Department of Defense as well as providing “critical microelectronics” for industries including test and measurement equipment and satellite communications.
–Keysight Technologies also this week said that Fortinet will be using Keysight’s APS-M8400 network cybersecurity test platform to validate its Fortigate 4800F next-generation firewall, in terms of its hyperscale distributed denial of service (DDoS) defense capabilities and carrier-grade performance.
