Huawei Technologies has today announced the launch of the industry's 'first' 3G / 2G Software Defined Radio (SDR) Single RAN product. The base station has been developed in close cooperation with technologists from Vodafone who are said to be exploring how to enhance the customer experience in a more cost-effective and energy efficient way.
The product enables mobile operators to seamlessly switch from 2G to 3G or use both simultaneously, with the potential to offer total cost of ownership savings to operators. The development is one of the first products from Huawei and Vodafone's Radio Mobile Innovation Centre based in Madrid, Spain.
Using Huawei's latest Remote Radio Unit, Huawei's Single RAN solution aims to provide greater cost efficiencies for operators in the areas of power consumption, transmission expense, footprint and maintenance costs when compared with traditional BTS solutions.
In either 2G, 3G or mixed mode, the solution is designed to enable operators to make significant CAPEX and OPEX savings because they only need to deploy a single Radio Access Network base station, compared to the costs involved with two independent 2G and 3G networks. Paving the way for technology evolution as well as protecting operators' network investment, Huawei's Single RAN Solution is also capable of seamlessly migrating to LTE.
"Vodafone has played a key role in helping to develop this innovative technology, which aims to deliver greater flexibility in terms of both running and planning increasingly cost effective networks in selected markets," said Andy MacLeod, Global Networks Director of Vodafone. "The ability to switch between different radio access technologies is designed to deliver a range of business benefits such as enabling the more efficient management of network capacity in appropriate markets. This technology also aims to reduce carbon emissions from base stations."
"Huawei is happy to have been able to collaborate closely with Vodafone to achieve this important industry milestone," said Wan Biao, the President of Huawei Wireless Product Line. "Over the course of its strategic partnership with Vodafone, Huawei has proven its significant track-record combining technological expertise with its customer-driven service capability. This strengthens Vodafone's leading market position as well as allowing Huawei to further build on one of the broadest product portfolios in the industry."