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Juniper Networks, a leader in secure, artificial intelligence (AI)-driven networks, today announced that it is collaborating with Intel to accelerate advancement in the Open RAN (ORAN) ecosystem. This joint initiative between two technology leaders represents another milestone for Juniper in its continuing efforts to bring openness and innovation to a traditionally closed-off part of the network, providing a faster route-to-market for service providers and enterprises to deliver 5G, edge computing and AI.

Juniper’s leadership role in ORAN reflects its commitment to bringing an experience-first network to customers through automation, intelligent control and assurance of experience. Juniper has made major investments to lead this exciting shift in the industry, beginning with the exclusive IP licensing agreement with Netsia, and continuing with significant involvement in the O-RAN Alliance. Juniper is heavily engaged in expanding integrations with key partners and is part of the innovation team building joint customer solutions in Intel’s 5G Lab.

Spending on Radio Access Networks (RAN) is a significant amount of service providers’ CapEx, primarily due to limited vendor choice and closed architectures which lead to lock-in. Juniper recognises that the RAN is a domain that demands openness and best-of-breed innovation to ensure the best experience for network operators and their customers, and is determined to lead the industry toward that vision.

Juniper’s collaboration with Intel includes the following:

• Juniper RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC) and Intel FlexRAN platform are pre-integrated and pre-validated to enhance usability of a full ORAN-compliant Intelligent RAN system
• Collaborative R&D work with Intel Labs for RIC platform-specific apps to improve customer experience, maximize ROI and drive rapid ORAN ecosystem innovation
• Joint customer testbeds with Intel to validate performance-improving implementation and speed of time-to-market

Juniper is an active member of the O-RAN Alliance, contributing to six working groups and serving as chair and co-chair of the slicing and use-case task groups, respectively. Juniper is also an editor of RIC specifications within the alliance.

“The virtualisation of the RAN continues to gain momentum across the industry as operators take advantage of cloud economics and the delivery of new services”, said Caroline Chan, VP at Intel Corporation and GM at Network Business Incubator Division. “This collaboration with Juniper and the validation of FlexRAN and RIC solutions will assist service providers to overcome integration challenges and accelerate time-to-market for future deployments”.

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