Baicells achieves industry-first outdoor o-ran certification milestone

The Open-RAN Alliance's (O-RAN) Open Testing and Integration Centre (OTIC) labs formally certified the Open Front Haul (OFH) Interface of the Macro O-RU platform in late April. 

The Baicells Gamma452E is a compact, high power, outdoor 4x40 Watt Remote RU that operates in both 4G and 5G NR mode supporting bands n40, n41, n48, and n78. It supports the O-RAN evolved Common Public Radio Interface 7-2a for integration with third-party O-RAN Distributed Units (O-DU). Already the first macro-outdoor O-RAN Radio Unit certified through the OTIC conformance test, it has also completed integration testing with several third-party O-RAN DUs.

The certification is an industry first and a major milestone for the delivery of O-RAN architectures that will help deliver the next generation of 5G-based mobility services. In a standards-based O-RAN architecture, the OFH is the open interface used to connect the Remote RU and the DU. By opening this interface to standards, it offers the ability to mix compliant equipment from different vendors, and economically deliver focused coverage and capacity to where it's needed. The architecture's flexibility helps build best-of-breed solutions tailor-made for the environments and communities they serve.

Baicells, one of the early members of the Open RAN Alliance, continues to demonstrate its commitment to the delivery of viable O-RAN solutions through the successful delivery of key functionality required for commercial adoption and deployment. Some of the world's largest mobile operators are members of the O-RAN Alliance, whose mission is to reshape the RAN industry toward more intelligent, open, and fully interoperable mobile networks.

"Baicells is an established technology and innovation leader and being the first in our industry to achieve this milestone only backs that up. We continue to be engaged with our ecosystem partners and mobile operators across our global footprint as they test and prepare for rolling out O-RAN architectures against their respective timetables." said Mr. Lixin Sun, Baicells CEO.

According to Research and Markets, the global Open RAN market is expected to surpass $32 billion by 2030, demonstrating a 42% CAGR, with the RU segment accounting for $9.9 billion of that total.

The Gamma452E has been moving through its final stages of testing and is already in planning for first trial deployments. General availability is planned for Q2 2023.