DOCOMO and NEC Complete Designing Carrier-grade, Hybrid Cloud, Redundant 5G SA Core Leveraging AWS, along with Successful Onboarding and Testing of 5G User Plane for Edge

Feb 22, 2023 15:43 JST

Source: NTT DOCOMO

- Key step towards realizing highly-available and flexible mobile networks -

TOKYO, Feb 22, 2023 - (JCN Newswire) - NTT DOCOMO, INC. and NEC Corporation today announced their completion of a high-level carrier-grade redundancy design for a 5G core network (5GC) hybrid-cloud environment leveraging Amazon Web Services (AWS) and DOCOMO's on-premises network functions virtualization (NFV) infrastructure. The design will allow DOCOMO to switch between DOCOMO's on-premises NFV and AWS infrastructure for 5GC redundancy operations, offering a more flexible and cost-effective means to manage network performance and capacity.

DOCOMO and NEC also successfully onboarded NEC's 5G User Plane Function1 software dedicated to edge computing (Edge UPF) on the AWS Graviton32 processor. The verification is expected to support the faster construction and reduced energy consumption of 5GCs and Edge UPFs for IoT use cases.

According to Naoki Tani, Executive Vice President, Chief Technology Officer, and Executive General Manager of R&D Innovation Division of NTT DOCOMO, "We are thrilled to announce the successful completion of this high-level design for a redundant 5GC hybrid cloud environment as well as onboarding an Edge UPF on AWS Graviton3 processor. NEC's highly reliable cloud-native 5GC/UPF software and AWS's innovatively energy-efficient AWS Graviton processor were key contributors to these great achievements. DOCOMO looks forward to delivering increasingly flexible and reliable mobile networks to customers."

Atsuo Kawamura, Executive Vice President, NEC Corporation, said, "We are pleased to see NTT DOCOMO running NEC's Converged Core on AWS Graviton3 with high availability and high performance while enabling significant power savings. These are key attributes of our solution, and a true testament to our cloud-native architecture to be able to scale out and run on-premises, on public clouds and hybrid environments. NEC is committed to building blocks for end-to-end, carrier-grade performance and sustainable networks that contribute to enriching the society of our future."

"Traditional network architectures require mobile network operators to build capacity to support peak traffic, a level that might only be reached a couple times a year, or design costly back-up networks for redundancy in the event of a natural disaster," said Adolfo Hernandez, Vice President, Telecom Industry at AWS. "By integrating AWS with DOCOMO's existing network functions virtualization (NFV) infrastructure, DOCOMO has the flexibility to offload traffic workloads to AWS, optimizing network performance, and reducing total upfront costs. Combined with the energy efficiencies to be gained from leveraging AWS Graviton3 processors, we can help DOCOMO gain flexibility and reduce operating expenses."

A demonstration environment based on the design will be showcased at the AWS exhibition booth, AWS Next Level, Upper Walkway, South Entrance, Fira Barcelona Gran Via, during MWC Barcelona 2023.

(1) User Plane Function is the part of the network that connects data from wireless networks to the Internet.
(2) The AWS Graviton is a processor developed by AWS for its cloud computing service. Graviton3 is the third-generation processor and Graviton2 is the second-generation processor. https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/graviton/

About NTT DOCOMO

NTT DOCOMO, Japan's leading mobile operator with over 86 million subscriptions, is one of the world's foremost contributors to 3G, 4G and 5G mobile network technologies. Beyond core communications services, DOCOMO is challenging new frontiers in collaboration with a growing number of entities ("+d" partners), creating exciting and convenient value-added services that change the way people live and work. Under a medium-term plan toward 2020 and beyond, DOCOMO is pioneering a leading-edge 5G network to facilitate innovative services that will amaze and inspire customers beyond their expectations. www.docomo.ne.jp/english/

About NEC Corporation

NEC Corporation has established itself as a leader in the integration of IT and network technologies while promoting the brand statement of "Orchestrating a brighter world." NEC enables businesses and communities to adapt to rapid changes taking place in both society and the market as it provides for the social values of safety, security, fairness and efficiency to promote a more sustainable world where everyone has the chance to reach their full potential. For more information, visit NEC at www.nec.com.

For further information, please contact:

NTT DOCOMO
Core Network Development Department, R&D Innovation Division
E-Mail: 5gc-on-hybrid-cloud-ml@nttdocomo.com

NEC
Network Services Business Planning Division
E-Mail: contact@nwsbu.jp.nec.com

Source: NTT DOCOMO
Sectors: Telecoms, 5G, Wireless, Apps