Author: Shiv Putcha

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Nokia is a company undergoing dramatic changes

Nokia is a company that is undergoing dramatic changes, not only in terms of a rapidly declining external environment but also in terms of pretty stark shifts in its strategy and internal alignment. Under CEO Pekka Lundmark, the company had already initiated a shift away from the end-to-end positioning that was espoused by his predecessor, Rajeev Suri, towards organic business units that were fully integrated and with empowered decision making. Perhaps stung by the loss of high-profile accounts like AT&T and an effective total retreat from North America, Nokia’s recent guidance has not made for pleasant reading and likely has helped accelerate the transition plan that had already been initiated. To be fair, there have been gains from other markets which have helped offset some of the high-profile account losses and market spend declines.

Nokia’s CEO made candid remarks highlighting guidance pointing to a top line decline of 10-15% in mobile networks, primarily due to the sharp declines in spending from India as operators there wind down their spending post the first wave of investment in 5G networks. While external headwinds continue, Nokia believes that the market has likely seen bottom and their expectation is a rebound, if not a surge, in spending as there is plenty of investment left to make in 5G, with Nokia citing research suggesting that only about 30% of 4G LTE sites globally have been upgraded to 5G. Besides operators investing in new 5G networks and brownfield operators upgrading to 5G Advanced, Lundmark also highlighted government support for “secure and trusted networks” as a key driver for Nokia as it is benefitting from swap outs in some markets.  

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Nokia Mobile Networks strategic and design philosophies are in stark contrast to competitors

We had the opportunity to listen to keynotes from the leadership team at Nokia Mobile Networks (MN), including Tommi Uitto, Ari Kynaslahti, Mark Atkinson and others. There are a number of key takeaways that we noted about the Midsummer launches but also with the overall approach of Nokia MN relative to its key competitors.

• The resurgent symbolism of the Midsummer launch cycle – Nokia has locked into a cadence of major product announcements at MWC Barcelona and launches at Midsummer. While disorienting to those of us who live in the tropics, Midsummer’s bright and warm embrace is an ideal time to bring innovations to market and can also be interpreted as symbolic of a resurgent Nokia.
• Flexibility and breadth of portfolio – Nokia MN launched several new products cutting across small cells and massive MIMO base stations, for both indoor and outdoor scenarios, as well as new microwave products. While there was a common theme of smaller form factors and energy efficiency underlying all new products, it as also apparent that Nokia MN is taking a portfolio approach, with different products targeting different industry segments. The latter is an important distinction relative to competition, suggesting that the tremendous diversity in mobile operator networks needs multiple options, but also that Nokia is able or willing to invest in segments that some of their competition don’t. An example of this approach is the new Tuuli 26e baseband product, which supports compact outdoor sites from 2G to 5G. similarly, Nokia has launched a new range of “Kolibri” small cells, with all in one indoor and outdoor variants as well as an option for CBRS support.         
• Openness will deliver best performance/cost ratios – repeated many times, openness has become a key pillar of Nokia MN’s messaging and positioning. As a philosophical approach, this positioning is predicated on a new reality where operators want to shift from traditional subscription models to a more on-demand model, where capacity and connectivity demands are elastic. For Nokia MN, openness encompasses many tactical shifts including a major focus on areas like CloudRAN, which has seen Nokia MN partner with a diverse group of cloud players including AWS, Google Cloud and others. Indeed, a senior exec from AWS delivered a keynote that professed to major progress made with Nokia on their “AnyRAN” strategy. Nokia MN’s openness approach is also evident in their product launches being compliant with Open RAN specifications. Beyond CloudRAN, Nokia is also working with a number of partners for CPUs (Nvidia, ARM and Intel), Radios (Fujitsur, Mavenir and others), Container as a Service players (RedHat, Google Cloud and more) and even for hardware (Dell, HPE etc). 
• Extended leadership in backhaul – one of the lesser reported and analyzed stories about Nokia MN is their leadership in backhaul solutions. Beyond fiber, for Nokia MN, this means microwave where they have been a leader for some time with their Wavence product line. This product line now extends to the E-band with the UBT-mU small form factor product, which can carry an average capacity of 10 Gbps, which is ideal for urban and hotspot deployments. E-band microwave solutions can be really effective for use cases like FWA. While FWA demand is surging, it is tough for operators to run fiber to every base station that is enabled for the service, both for cost and topological reasons.

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Energy efficiency has become a core mantra

Another oft-repeated mantra for Nokia MN throughout the sessions was energy efficiency as a core design principle. This message is hardly unique to Nokia but it was telling to see the holistic way in which crucial requirement for mobile operators is being approached within the company. Beyond claims of % savings for new products, there is an inherent recognition that energy efficiency will come from better hardware and software designs, with a healthy dose of AI sprinkled in for iterative learnings and efficiency gains.

• On the hardware side, Nokia’s ReefShark SoC’s are driving efficiency gains as are in-house RFIC designs for Wavence microwave products.
• On the software side, lower energy consumption through new features like intelligent switch-off of idle radios, extreme deep sleep and improved use of AI/ML will all make a big dent.   
• Zero footprint and low-footprint site solutions with liquid cooled baseband technology will help lower cooling system energy consumption by up to 90%.
• Nokia is also working on implementing AI in all of their digital services offerings to customers, including digital twins for network design and optimization; site infrastructure design, and also for deployment related services like Nokia AI Digital Assistant.

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Honorable mentions

We would be remiss not to briefly mention a number of the other initiatives that Nokia is working on. These include a big push on network APIs through their “Network as a Code” platform in partnership with aggregators like Infobip and cloud providers like Google Cloud.  Nokia MN is also a member of the recently created AI-RAN Alliance that is pushing for increased usage of AI in the RAN for driving increases spectral efficiency, for allocating idle RAN resources for AI workloads and also using AI to drive increased efficiencies at the network edge.

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Future outlook

There is no immediate easing of the external headwinds that are facing the industry. That said, Nokia MN appears to finally be emerging from its transition period with a refreshed portfolio of products that cater to multiple industry segments and deployment scenarios, while also keeping openness and energy efficiency as core design principles. Nokia MN has a lot riding on their bet that operators want increased flexibility and choice for their networks. While Nokia has doubled down on its strategy and recent investments, a lot will ultimately depend on operator strategic choices – double down on purpose-built networks or opt for optimized, “open” solutions that offer elastic “on-demand” capacity.

Author: Shiv Putcha

A few weeks after Mobile World Congress 2024, the dust is settling on news flows from and prior to the event. Unsurprisingly, there were several major themes from MWC24, the biggest of which was linked to artificial intelligence (AI), its offshoots like GenAI and their relevance to the telecom industry. But despite AI being the biggest buzzword, there were plenty of other themes that were in evidence.

Sustainability was one of the major themes at the show. There is no question that sustainability is a hot topic within the telecom industry but at MWC24, it seemed that sustainability was embedded into overarching messaging, but it was not quite the centerpiece. This was somewhat curious given that overall industry awareness of sustainability concerns are now quite widespread. Or perhaps, and much more likely, sustainability is no longer a buzzword. Rather, the industry has already moved into an execution phase.

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5G momentum must be met with increased energy efficiency

5G today has really strong global momentum with both commercial and planned deployments. 5G has become widely deployed around the world and much faster than previous generations of cellular technology.

But it’s not all smooth sailing. On the one hand, 5G is scaling rapidly and will hit 25% of total cellular connections by 2025. But on the other hand, there is an inherent paradox in that there is a hard tradeoff with surging data consumption from strong adoption of 4G LTE as well as 5G services. The surge in data traffic will drive energy costs sky high unless something is done to fundamentally change the current paradigm.

This is where sustainability concerns have come to the forefront of consciousness for telecom operators around the world. With revenue pressure at the top line becoming an increasing concern, profitability is increasingly linked to better operating performance and lower expenses. Energy efficiency is the benchmark that most have zeroed in on but energy efficiency for telcos must be approached in a holistic manner. It will not come from one or two, but rather a variety of sources, including new spectral and network efficiencies, sunsetting of 2G/3G networks, and greater use of renewables.

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The RAN is lowest hanging fruit to tackle energy efficiency

As we look across the globe, the transition to 5G is well underway. In some places, the second wave of 5G CAPEX has already begun as we look at upgrades to Standalone and eventually 5G Advanced. This has major implications for the RAN, not only with new sites required but also densification to support growing data traffic. The tradeoff naturally is increased energy consumption in the aggregate, even if the per bit rate is lower for 5G. Research from GSMA Intelligence shows energy consumption by the RAN as over 80% of total network consumption. That is a very big “nut to crack”. How do operators go about planning this transition with a view to driving sustainability into the RAN?

Energy consumption in the RAN is being sourced from a number of areas, with the majority, 73%, coming from the traditional grid, while 21% comes from renewables and 6% from diesel. European telecom groups continue to build on their early lead from both an energy efficiency perspective as well as the proportion of energy consumption coming from renewable energy sources. North America comes in second with significant investment in recent years, while Africa and Asia are playing catch up.

GSMA Intelligence tracks industry-level progress on energy efficiency through the Telco Energy Benchmark study. During 2023, GSMA Intelligence built a dataset based on 65 networks and 1.6 billion connections. As there are no single metrics to measure energy efficiency, GSMA Intelligence is using a combination of 4 KPIs. But to highlight just one, our sample shows that operators used an average of 0.15 kWh of energy to transfer 1GB of data across the network.

There are already a number of initiatives being undertaken to improve energy efficiency in the RAN. These include site simplification and physical modernization, spectrum refarming and user migration to more efficient networks, using highly integrated hardware, adoption of advanced cooling systems and now even using AI and other techniques to optimize energy consumption.  

GSMA Intelligence’s Energy Efficency benchmark report can be downloaded here

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The right planning tools can go a long way in tackling energy efficiency in the RAN

As mobile operators, whether they are greenfield or brownfield, go about making decisions about their RAN, there are a number of considerations that must be taken into account. The first priority for operators is, of course, coverage. In other words, how to maximize coverage as well as capacity with available resources. But now, the additional layer of complexity that has entered the calculus is how to maximize coverage and capacity with sustainability in mind. For example, for a brownfield operator, if they need to upgrade a site to 5G, or even deploy a new site for 5G altogether, what are the considerations and tradeoffs on energy efficiency that they need to account for.

Similarly, for operators, understanding the RAN’s energy consumption during peak loads and forced sleep modes is crucial. Companies like EDX Wireless offer products like EDX’s SignalPro, where these scenarios can be accurately modeled for any base station model, offering precise metrics on energy consumption and Quality of Service (QoS) for end users. EDX Wireless uses the EARTH framework (Energy Efficiency Evaluation Framework (E3 F)) 3GPP [TR36.814R9] for the quantification of energy savings in wireless networks. This involves assessing the power consumption of the entire system, considering each component of the base station contributing to energy consumption. Additionally, it provides the energy factor for both loaded and unloaded networks. It is also important to model accurately across different base station models and technologies. EDX Wireless’s method incorporates methodologies and metrics that enable comparisons between different base station models, technologies and end user QoS. The throughput to each user can be forecasted when cells are in and out of sleep modes, hence allowing for intelligent optimization decisions.

EDX Wireless also allows for the usage of a digital twin to allow network engineers to simulate the conditions under which a particular site would work, with energy efficiency metrics layered into the analysis. The ability to plan in a simulated environment before field work can go a long way towards improving energy efficiency in the RAN. Similarly, planning tools like EDX’s SignalPro can help them identify which sites that consume the most energy, and then they know where to invest CAPEX for upgrades.

In conclusion, 5G is more energy efficient but this will take time to play out. Sustainability in the network must be viewed holistically. It is important that the RAN harvests data and turns these into actionable insights. To do this, operators need the right tools.