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Digital meets 5G—in the OSS/BSS layer

5G will impact your digital transformation. Yet 5G business success will only come with digitalization. What is the true meaning of these statements? Listen to Ervin van Rijssen, Head of 5G Core Program at Ericsson, as he provides a four-minute technology overview on the road to become a digital 5G service provider. Without giving away all the details, it is about core network evolution and a digital support system stack. Are you prepared?

Marketing Director, Digital Services

Marketing Director, Digital Services

Marketing Director, Digital Services

The video below is an extract from an exclusive Mobile World Live interview by GSMA’s Justin Springham with Ericsson's Eva Hedfors and Erwin van Rijssen.

 

 

Summary of the video

Here are five key take-aways from the interview with Erwin van Rijssen

  1. 5G will reduce the cost of a transported bit by a factor 10—a necessity to meet the predicted 8x growth in global traffic volumes in the next five years (Source: Ericsson Mobility Report, June 2018).
  2. Evolution of the core network is essential to meet demands. Initially, many operators will deploy 5G in densely populated areas with 5G radio connected to LTE. The latter serves as the anchor point and still connects to the packet core as we know it today with certain extensions. This is referred to as option 3 in the 3GPP standard. Going forward operators will deploy 5G on a much broader scale. At this point 5G new radio will connect directly to the packet core. This is defined with a new 3GPP architecture and is referred to as option 2.
  3. With the predicted traffic growth, the ability to separate the user plane from the control plane in the packet core is key to optimizing the routing of large data volumes through the network. This capability is also a fundamental for network slicing, enabling industrial use cases through guaranteed quality of service in the network.
  4. We will see huge changes in both the OSS and the BSS layer. What will be key within the OSS layer is orchestration functionality, enabling automated network operations.
  5. From the BSS layer, it becomes very important to provide more flexibility in enabling new business models, for example, business models where the operator sells not only to consumers but also to other service providers. Exposure of new APIs is a critical capability when looking for new revenue-generating 5G use cases.

Where digital meets 5G

Let me close this blog post with Erwin's statement: "These changes in OSS/BSS are really fundamental for enabling 5G and it's exactly where digital meets 5G."

What do you think?

I would be interested in hearing your opinions and stories on the topic of how digitalization meets 5G. Please engage with us on Twitter and LinkedIn or contact us here.
 

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