Axiata Group Berhad (Axiata) has deployed the MAVair Open vRAN solution at selected sites in Malaysia and Indonesia, which includes all G Open RAN, Packet Core, and mobile network applications. The sites chosen are connected with non-ideal backhaul and in certain cases satellite, to replicate non-ideal backhaul conditions, notably for rural areas, making these the first satellite backhaul powered Open vRAN locations in the world.
The Group had previously performed commercial Open RAN field pilots in the countries in collaboration with Mavenir and Parallel Wireless Incorporated, using Infosys Limited as a systems integrator (SI). Axiata was able to achieve live commercial service integration of the Telecom Infra Project’s (TIPEvenstar) 4G Radio through Mavenir’s MAVair O-RAN based solution for Open RAN during the pilot phase.
The trial also includes a partnership with Parallel Wireless that allowed 2G and 4G technology to be placed on the same radio equipment, with the baseband running on an x86 COTS platform and all other apps running on Axiata’s OpenStack cloud infrastructure. The 3-Sector, 4-Sector, and 6-Sector field trials are now available for commercial use.