O-RAN ALLIANCE's Certification and Badging Program Gains Momentum to Accelerate the Adoption of Open and Intelligent RAN

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Apr 25, 2024, 13:39 ET

The O-RAN ALLIANCE Certification and Badging Program aims to accelerate the adoption of open and intelligent Radio Access Networks (RAN) through building confidence in O-RAN products and solutions world-wide
First O-RAN Certificates and Badges issued by Japan OTIC, Korea OTIC and the European OTIC in Berlin, adding to total of 23 issued to date
16 companies currently offer products or solutions with O-RAN certification on the open RAN market

BONN, Germany, April 25, 2024 /PRNewswire/ -- Since its launch in June 2022, the O-RAN ALLIANCE's (O-RAN) Certification and Badging Program has been set out to accelerate the adoption of open and intelligent Radio Access Networks (RAN) through building confidence in O-RAN products and solutions world-wide. As such, the certification process supports the O-RAN ecosystem to efficiently progress with O-RAN product deployments.

Open Testing and Integration Centre (OTIC) logo

Open Testing and Integration Centres (OTICs) around the world

Two Open Testing and Integration Centres (OTICs) – the European OTIC in Berlin and Korea OTIC – have recently issued their first-ever O-RAN Certificates and Badges. Japan OTIC issued its first O-RAN Certificates and Badges in June 2023 and continued with five more awarded in 2024.

The portfolio of certified O-RAN products currently counts 23 solutions from 16 companies, awarded by 5 OTICs, with more being in progress around the world. All awarded O-RAN Certificates and Badges, including company names and concrete products, are publicly available in the O-RAN ALLIANCE's Certification and Badging Catalogue.

"Japan OTIC is committed to support testing and integration efforts in the industry to promote implementation of open, interoperable, intelligent, virtualized and secure RAN," said Masataka Kawauchi, Representative Director, Japan OTIC and Chairman, YRP R&D Promotion Committee. "Since its establishment in December 2022, we have worked with Japanese operator members to prepare environment and capabilities for testing based on O-RAN ALLIANCE specifications and are pleased to have issued two conformance certificates and E2E system badge to six products to date. The certified/badged equipment has been deployed to the commercial market. We expect more to follow with ongoing activities and additional requests received for the program and are also working to enhance our test capabilities and coverage. Together with other engagements like PlugFests and workshops, Japan OTIC will continue contributing towards realizing Open RAN together with the industry."

"Deutsche Telekom, as the host of the European OTIC in Berlin facilitated by i14y Lab is thrilled to celebrate this significant milestone of the first O-RAN certificates in Europe together with the O-RAN community, and especially with the award recipients for their commitment to O-RAN compliance," said Petr Ledl, VP Network Trials and Integration Lab, Deutsche Telekom. "The value for operators in having certified solutions is the confidence that their conformance has been rigorously tested and assessed, which will minimize the integration complexity of open RAN solutions going forward. For vendors, O-RAN certification supports promotion of products and solutions. Both operator and vendor communities benefit from minimized repetition of tests and savings on testing efforts."

"We are glad to see the 1^st O-RU certificate in Korea this year following the establishment of Korea OTIC (KOTC) at the end of last year," said Geunwoo Park, Representative of the Korea OTIC. "With the issuance of the 1^st certificate, we will not only provide testing and certification services for domestic companies' O-RUs but also interoperability between various open RAN equipment in Korea and beyond."

The O-RAN Certification and Badging Program runs in collaboration with OTICs that are authorized to issue O-RAN Certificates and Badges. The O-RAN authorized OTICs are vendor-independent, ensuring the award of impartial O-RAN Certificates and Badges. Over time, the OTIC community has been growing in global presence, currently comprising 19 OTICs, operating in a healthy market-driven ecosystem.

There are three types of O-RAN certifications:

O-RAN Certificate verifies that a product is compliant to O-RAN specifications, using O-RAN conformance tests.
O-RAN Interoperability (IOT) Badge proves interoperability of a pair of products connected via an O-RAN interface or O-RAN-profiled 3GPP interface, using O-RAN interoperability tests.
O-RAN End-to-End (E2E) Badge demonstrates and validates that an end-to-end system or subsystem meets minimum requirements on functionality and security, using O-RAN end-to-end tests. It can also provide an indication of performance or other end-to-end functionalities.

The O-RAN Certification and Badging Program refers to O-RAN test specifications. To date, 13 O-RAN test specifications have been published to support driving comprehensive testing of O-RAN based products, groups of products, and systems. Development of additional testing specifications goes hand in hand with O-RAN ALLIANCE's overall specification effort ensuring readiness for testing of mature areas.

For more details on the O-RAN Certification and Badging Program please refer to our website and white paper.

"Certification of O-RAN products and systems brings clear benefits to both operators and vendors," said Alex Jinsung Choi, Chair of the Board of O-RAN ALLIANCE and SVP Group Technology, Deutsche Telekom. "We encourage the entire O-RAN ecosystem to consider active engagement in the O-RAN Certification and Badging Program, which aims to accelerate the adoption of open and intelligent RAN solutions."

About O-RAN ALLIANCE
The O-RAN ALLIANCE is a world-wide community of more than 300 mobile operators, vendors, and research & academic institutions operating in the Radio Access Network (RAN) industry. As the RAN is an essential part of any mobile network, the O-RAN ALLIANCE's mission is to re-shape the industry towards more intelligent, open, virtualized and fully interoperable mobile networks. The new O-RAN specifications enable a more competitive and vibrant RAN supplier ecosystem with faster innovation to improve user experience. O-RAN based mobile networks at the same time improve the efficiency of RAN deployments as well as operations by mobile operators. To achieve this, the O-RAN ALLIANCE publishes new RAN specifications, releases open software for the RAN, and supports its members in integration and testing of their implementations.
For more information, please visit www.o-ran.org.

SOURCE O-RAN Alliance