The company has also created a new division, its Communications Technology Group, to focus on this emerging area.
The change will enable operators to move applications to the edge, said Phil Mottram (pictured), the former Zayo executive who is senior VP and general manager of the HPE unit.
“We at HPE believe we are well positioned to serve this market,” he said. “Historically operators would buy one box from one provider, but 5G is way more open for operators to mix and match.”
HPE is also contributing to two of the major industry organisations that are focusing on open radio access networks (open RANs), the O-RAN Alliance, which represents operators, and the Facebook-backed Telecom Infra Project (TIP).
Enterprises want to move applications to the edge in order to reduce latency, said Mottram. “The hyperscalers are supporting this move to the edge, but that’s where they meet the telcos providing the wide area network. We are supporting both the telcos and the communications needs of the hyperscalers.”
The company is also trying out open systems in the core network, working with Orange. Having already made a call “on a multivendor 5G standalone network chain”, with HPE, Orange is “going further and are testing the concept of a 100% software-based, data and AI-driven, fully automated 5G Core”, said Emmanuel Bidet, VP of convergent networks control at Orange.
“HPE brings a set of cloud native, standards-compliant network functions, and the automation of slice management that can be replicated for end to end integration in each country. The first results are really encouraging and Orange appreciates the strong involvement from HPE teams,” said Bidet.
Claus Pedersen, HPE’s VP of infrastructure solutions, said: “HPE is not positioning ourselves to compete with traditional vendors.” But, “we’re extending into the core of the network and the RAN in particular”.
The RAN is opening up because of increased complexity of 5G networks, which will need small base stations at high frequencies, “thousands of sites instead of tens of sites”, said Pedersen. “The opening of the RAN, it’s happening today.”
