About 55% of survey respondents said they were seriously considering an O-RAN strategy
Companies are increasingly interested in adopting an open RAN (O-RAN) approach, according to a study by Jabil, a US manufacturing services company.
A survey of 193 companies conducted for Jabil by SIS International Research found that 57% of the companies surveyed believe that O-RAN will be ready for mass deployment alongside 5G in the next two years. Also, 55% of survey respondents reported that they are seriously considering an O-RAN strategy whereas another 22% report already has an effective strategy. Across the board, survey participants believe that O-RAN will reduce capital and operating costs, the survey found.
According to the survey, about 44% of respondents believe that cloud service providers, including Google Cloud, AWS and Microsoft Azure, play a role in O-RAN strategies, while 67% of those companies have existing strategies for O-RAN.
Jabil commissioned SIS International Research to conduct the 2022 5G Technology Trends Survey, which includes 193 stakeholders directly involved in the development, implementation or adoption of 5G technology in leading telecommunications companies in North America, Europe, the Middle East and Asia-Pacific.
The survey found that 64% of respondents thought it would take another one to three years for 5G technology to become widely accepted.
However, 65% of respondents cited 5G as a higher technology that would dramatically transform telecommunications, up 16% from a similar poll in 2018.
“The ever-increasing complexity and diversity of 5G creates a lot of opportunities as well as barriers for traditional telco service providers, equipment manufacturers and software developers,” said Emanuel Cavallaro, president of Jabil’s communications and networking division.
More than half (59%) of surveyed companies believe that the transition to 5G will create opportunities for new telecom companies, while 53% said it would provide a new business model, with 32% citing lack of spectrum as the biggest challenge for 5G deployments.
Additional business model challenges for 5G deployments include creating subscription models (31%); Government regulations (27%); And loss of market share (25%) by OTT providers. Across the board, operational challenges have eased but the lack of network mapping (32%) and 5G-enabled devices (31%) still causes problems, according to the survey.
Meanwhile, 93% of respondents believe that 5G will increase partnerships between service providers and software or web service companies.
