Telefónica backs lobbyist drive for Huawei alternatives

Telefónica Group lent its name to the Open RAN Policy Coalition, a new lobbying organisation that appears focused on steering US policy towards support for creating an environment where multi-vendor network set-ups will become a practical reality.

As the group was unveiled, the opening declaration called for greater network openness and flexibility in a post-pandemic world, created through open interfaces between radios, hardware, and software. Beneath that, the message appears to be ‘if you don’t want Huawei domination, give us alternatives’. Tellingly, the official launch of the coalition highlighted open RAN’s benefits for operators that wish to “potentially move more quickly to replace or address vulnerable network equipment when reacting to threats”.

The Washington, DC-based organisation is particularly hoping to attract support for its aims from the US federal government, and is seeking to draw out this anticipated open RAN backing in several ways:

• Using government procurement as a tool for fostering vendor diversity.
• Heightening of investment in research and development.
• Securing of a degree of latitude from regulators on the nature of new solutions deployed within networks.
• Lowering of barriers on network deployment for 5G services.

Absent friends

Huawei is not the only notable absentee from the list of supporting partners, with Ericsson also a glaring omission.

Instead, the coalition largely comprises emerging vendors already leveraging the opportunity to build business with operators based on open RAN technology, such as Altiostar (where Telefónica is an investor), Mavenir, and Parallel Wireless. The big IT vendors are also well represented, as are mid-sized telecoms suppliers eying opportunities in a transformed approach to infrastructure, alongside the internet giants.

The operators in the organisation are a pretty global group, featuring: AT&T, NTT, Verizon Communications, and Vodafone. DT, as a leading European open RAN advocate and key US player, is a surprising absentee — which is presumably not unrelated to the close relationship the operator’s American business T-Mobile US has with Ericsson (and perhaps also to Huawei, in Europe), and that open RAN-enabling its network is probably not at the top of its priority list, given its focus on bedding in its recent Sprint takeover.

TIP sends its compliments

The Facebook-fuelled Telecom Infra Project (TIP), which is well represented among the members of the lobbying group, predictably welcomed the development, describing it as complementary to its efforts on developing open specifications.

Nokia and Ericsson talk up their own open credentials

After not featuring at the launch of the new lobbying group, Nokia took steps to insert itself in the discussion of open RAN policy in the USA. Within ten days of the new group’s unveiling, Nokia Americas’ Vice-President of Policy & Public Affairs Brian Hendricks led efforts to highlight the vendor’s role in the O-RAN Alliance and TIP, and portray Nokia as a meaningful contributor towards open standards development.

However, Nokia’s support is not unequivocal, and it is also lobbying American politicians to prevent open RAN equipment from becoming the default option in all new deployments. It provided testimony to US Senate hearings on legislation that would require regional operators that are planning to switch out equipment from banned vendors, such as Huawei and ZTE, and adopt an open RAN approach in order to receive government financial support for the transition. Nokia considered that a “technology-neutral” approach should be taken instead, maximising the chance of it securing contracts attracting state-funded subsidies.

Ericsson, meanwhile, suggested that government policy would be best focused on spectrum allocation, and that existing standards bodies are best placed to oversee open standards.