In The Arena by TechArena - A VRAN Deep Dive with Intel

Episode Date: February 9, 2023

TechArenaTechArena host Allyson Klein chats with Intel vice president of wireless access networks Cristina Rodriguez about the white hot VRAN market.TEXT

Welcome to the Tech Arena, featuring authentic discussions between tech's leading innovators and our host, Alison Klein. Now, let's step into the arena. Welcome to the Tech Arena. My name is Alison Klein, and I am so excited about today's episode. We are delving into the world of edge, and I am delighted to introduce my guest, Cristina Rodriguez. She's Vice President and General Manager of the Wireless Access Network Division at Intel, and a friend of mine. Welcome to the program, Christina. It's great to see you. Thank you, Alison. It's great to be here talking to you. Such a treat for me. Looking forward to it. So, Christina, the topic for today is edge and everything associated with edge.

The Tech Arena has been trying to provide an update on edge computing, where we are as an industry, as well as are our definitions holding about what edge is really all about? You spend your life on the edge. Why don't you just start with giving a vision for what you think about in terms of edge computing and what it comprises? So Alison, generally edge refers to processing data as close as possible to the point of collection where the data is being generated to drive quicker, more efficient, both decision making, but also action based on that data. For the past decade, as you know, we've all been working together to transform the cloud and core networks to be more basically software-defined everything.

Now the transformation is moving out to the edge, to edge infrastructure and endpoints or far edge, like the ready access network. The reason for this is simple. There is so much data at the edge. If you put compute closer to it, you get faster insights from all this previously untapped information.

You can process it right there, all that data, and make a decision right there. And this will allow you to do everything that you can think of. So many use cases that are sensitive, for example, latency. It goes from improving production quality to delivering real-time personalized advertising or video content to automating a warehouse, you name it. And by the way, just to give you a data point, the edge has the highest CAGR of any compute location,

even higher than the public cloud. Gartner, the analyst, for example, predicts that by 2025, more than 50% of the data will reside at the edge, outside of central data centers. You know, it's interesting. This is one of the things that I wanted to talk to you about, so I'm glad that you brought up that Gartner survey. Over the last couple of years, we've heard so much about the unprecedented growth in cloud because we were all in our homes ordering things on Amazon. No, just kidding.

The cloud was so important to every aspect of our lives. But what happened to the edge in the same time period? I wanted to catch up with you and what you've seen working with customers around adoption of edge and where we are in 2023 as we consider this technology. You've been super important, right? And continue being critical to the future of the network, the future of society. If you think about it, the edge coming from every place, from enterprise, from the public and private network, everything that goes around us, there is an opportunity there to have data,

collect that data, analyze that data, and also to offer a service and monetize that service. So if you think about it from the quality of life, from the service to society, to the business needs, there is an opportunity there that is getting more and more realistic, real as we go by. When you think about edge, it's very easy to start thinking about a time period that we're entering right now, which is Mobile World Congress season. This year, Mobile World Congress will be back in a big way.

I know it has been held during the pandemic, but in a smaller capacity. What are you most excited to see what the industry is delivering around edge? And what do you think are the technologies that we'll be talking about at Mobile World as the industry unveils their innovations? Yeah, no, Mobile World Congress this year is going to be fantastic. And within that, the area very close to me, the virtualization of the RAN, I think we're going to hear a lot about it. And a few subtopics

I'm going to say within that. 2023 in general is a very important year for VRAN. We have gone from trials, lab trials and field trials to real deployment and real commercial deployments at scale. And this is important for the public cloud, but it's also very important for the entire edge space. I think we're going to hear a lot about that. I think we're going to hear a lot

about sustainability. How do we make those networks more efficient, less consumption of power? And how do we bring, for example, things like artificial intelligence into it? So just a tremendous amount of technology associated to the radio access network, the virtual radio access network. And we at Intel, we have several things, multiple things going on that are going to accelerate all this build up around the edge and the RAN and the network in general. And we're super excited about that.

We have a few demos in our booth that we'd love to show to you and to your listeners. So, Christina, let's go back to VRAN for a second. This is an alphabet soup place in the industry like none other. You've got VRAN, you've got OpenVRAN, you've got mobile edge computing. Help us make sense of the different technologies in this space and why VRAN is so important. You mentioned this, why it's so important for the cloud, why it's important for edge proliferation. Absolutely. And it's all related, right? All the different things, but they're all related. And at the center of it, there is the need for that technology

that is going to enable everything and that we believe that Intel plays such a big role with it. If you take the edge and the capability to process, to collect and process data closer where to the data is generated. So that's one thing. But how do you do that in the best possible way? Well, you need a network infrastructure that allows you to maximize flexibility, the scalability, and to bring the, I'm going to say, software, global software community to inject innovation, develop those applications in every different segment to then produce or be able to offer new services and new experiences. So it all comes together. But if we go to Open RAN and VRAN, they're closely related again.

Open RAN is about opening interfaces in the radio access network. VRAN is about virtualizing that network. It's about taking functions that before were in fixed functioning in purpose-built equipment or hardware, running all that in software. And when you do that, you now have an open-com platform

that the whole world understands with a cloud architecture that allows you to just run that network. HyperScalers have done for many years very successful. Now you have all that infrastructure that allows you the flexibility, the scalability, innovation that exists and be unleashed in the world. So that is very important. When I think about different things that different parts of the industry talk about, like 5G network slicing, like fully distributed computing from edge to cloud based on cloud architectures. It seems like virtualizing the RAN is at the heart

and at a foundational level of all of those things. Absolutely. When you're talking about being in deployments, what does that look like today? And where do you think it's going to go? You talked about the CAGR of Edge, but what's the CAGR of VRAN look like? Tremendous progress and tremendous momentum, I'm going to say in the last couple of years. We went from trials to deployment, commercial deployment, and then commercial deployment at a scale. I'll give you a few data points, and then commercial deployment at a scale. I'll give you a few data points, and I think this is very telling. For example, we have, say, Verizon right here in the U.S.

announcing in December that they have now deployed more than 10,000 virtualized cell sites across the United States. And that officially marks the crossing the halfway point, the 20,000 that they want to do by 2025. So that's a tremendous accomplishment. You have DISH, for example, Greenfield. Mid-year, last year, they launched the first cloud-native open-rground-based 5G network. And since then, they have expanded service to more than 120 cities across the country, offering 5G broadband services to over 20% of the U.S. population.

You have, for example, Rakuten Mobile, the Japanese operator. They have been deploying for a while now, both 4G and 5G, again, cloud-native end-to-end network, and proving again that Open RAN is ready for a scale. I mentioned Vodafone and Telefonica in Europe. They have also deployed commercially virtualized Open RAN sales sites. So tremendous momentum. I think in 2023, we'll see more of that. The industry's learning has been a process. This is not something that we knew

that was going to happen overnight, but the industry's learning, we are being very good about sharing and collaborating and sharing experience across the entire industry and ecosystem. So I think we'll continue seeing the acceleration of the virtualization of RAN. When you think about the impetus for moving, obviously anytime you move from a siloed proprietary technology

to something that's open, there's going to be a play of cost savings involved. The move to cloud native and the move to a cloud-based architecture obviously has some benefit from workload oversight and automated provisioning of services in the RAN. What else does it play here in terms of the benefits from a provider perspective to move to VRAN technology? That's a very good point, Alison. Very good point because multiple things that we get with the cloud native approach and the virtualization of the network. Number one, that is the capex, right? And the economy of a scale that you get when you are using a server based equipment, right? So that's that. But then you also have the OPEX aspect of it. And you

mentioned that, how much do you save in operation? How much are you capable of saving in operation when you have, for example, the ability to do software upgrades much more easier? You have the ability to have people, a bigger pool of developers and skill sets that can come to that network and offer new applications. You have things, for example, social power efficiency and power management. I would mention again, the couple of things that we're doing in that area. Some of them we're going to show it in the Mobile World Congress, TCM Barcelona, you know, there is capabilities there as part of that cloud virtualized environment that help us reduce the power consumption. There is features such as you mentioned network slicing, that's a sophisticated advanced feature that will enable

use cases that we already have in mind at this point, for example, the ability to pull base station and digital units and radio units in smart ways, the ability to bring artificial intelligence to manage intelligently a spectrum or, again, upgrade the zero-touch automation, right? Every operator would love to have a secret operation. I truly do not believe that you can get to all that fast enough unless you have a virtualized network all the way from layer one. Layer one is the most intense compute layer of the workload. And if you get all the way down to the layer where virtualized end-to-end, I think that's the way that we get there faster and with a more number of requirements met. You know, what's exciting about what you just described is the type of applications and capabilities that this technology will unleash for users as well as businesses. And you can just imagine what people can create when this kind of capability is put out there.

I can't wait to see it. I do want to talk to you about something that surprised and delighted me to see, which was the introduction of VRAN acceleration into the Xeon scalable processor at your Sapphire Rapids launch. Do you want to talk about that and why Intel decided to bake VRAM acceleration into the mainstream processor lineup? Yeah, absolutely. We're super excited about that. As you know, we're now rolling out already our Intel fourth generation of processors, codenamed Sapphire Rapid, and we announced it earlier in January.

One of the things that we're super excited about Sapphire Rapid is that we can double the capacity for RAN workloads compared to the prior generation. So double the capacity within the same power envelope. So super important in the RAN, and you say why we did that, in the RAN space, performance per watt is critical, right? This equipment is going to be on a cell tower, it's going to be on a place where there is a limited budget for power consumption. So the performance per watt is very important and the

capacity that you can get within the power envelope is very important. So we're doubling that to what we did before. On top of that, we have a new feature in this fourth generation that is called VRAM Boost. This is an acceleration that we put inside this part of the CPU. With that, you don't need any external accelerator. You don't need to have any PCI card doing any additional accelerator. Everything is already on the CPU. And that, in addition to all the goodness of the simplified solution, you also save right off the bat 20% of power savings because you don't need any external accelerators.

So performance per watt, additional power saving, and then the simplification of the supply chain, because now you just need a server. You don't need a PCI on the card in there. You have everything you need to process the RAND workload. And that's lower bump cost, lower board complexity, reduced TCO, simplified system integration, reduced supply chain complexity, all that comes together. Wow, that was a lot. I can't wait to see it when I get to Barcelona. Christina, it was lovely having you on the show. I can't wait to hear more about what you and the Intel team will be doing with the industry at Mobile World and keep the conversation going.

One final question for you. If folks want to engage with you online or learn more about what you and the team are doing, where would you send them for more information? Sure. And absolutely. I can't wait to see you at MWC and talk, catch up with you in person. You and your listeners, what is going on in our booth. But as far as connecting, LinkedIn is always a great way. I try to, you and I are connected there. I try to share as much as possible without going overboard on LinkedIn. There's so much to share. Of course, I can't share it all, but another good source is following at Intel Business. And then on Twitter, you can follow at Intel 5G Networks. And of course, anybody on MWC will be super happy to post them and show them what we have going in our technology and our solutions. Fantastic. Well, thank you so much for your time today, Christina. It was a real pleasure.

Thank you, Alison. Thank you so much. Thanks for joining the Tech Arena. Subscribe and engage at our website, thetecharena.net. All content is copyright by the Tech Arena.