Ericsson and Turkcell strengthen partnership with 5G Cloud RAN trial deployment

• Ericsson and Turkcell have successfully completed a trial deployment of Ericsson 5G Cloud RAN technology.
• Turkcell becomes one of the first communications service providers in the world  to try this technology.
• With the deployment of Ericsson's 5G Cloud RAN technology, Turkcell will benefit from greater flexibility and scalability in its network, enabling faster rollout of next-generation services.

Aimed at enhancing connectivity and network capabilities, Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) and Turkcell (NYSE: TKC; BIST: TCELL) today announced a successful trial deployment of the Ericsson 5G Cloud Radio Access Network (RAN) technology on Turkcell's network. With the deployment, Turkcell becomes one of the first communications service providers (CSPs) globally to try this technology. 

In this trial, Ericsson supplied hardware and software and conducted demonstrations, test cases and performance assessments. The deployment of Ericsson 5G Cloud RAN will provide Turkcell with increased flexibility and scalability, enabling faster delivery of innovative services to the market.

Ericsson Cloud RAN is a cloud-native solution that virtualizes RAN functions and decouples hardware from software, offering new opportunities to scale and foster network efficiency and virtualization to CSPs that want to implement cloud-native technology and open network architecture.

By adopting Cloud RAN technology, Turkcell aims to introduce new software features and incorporate an Open RAN approach into its service management and orchestration (SMO) framework. It will also be able to improve network management capabilities with rApps, for both cloud RAN and purpose-built deployments. The implementation of Cloud RAN is expected to boost flexibility and agility, as well as unlock new features through centralized deployments.

Prof. Dr. Vehbi Çağrı Güngör, Chief Network Technologies Officer at Turkcell, says: "As one of the first examples in the world, the trial of the 5G Cloud RAN technology conducted with Ericsson will contribute to strengthening Turkcell’s strategy for cloudifying network operations. This initiative, which represents a new step in Turkcell’s technological leadership, will also support our transition to an Open RAN network strategy and enhance the advanced connectivity experience we offer in Türkiye. At Turkcell, we are committed to investing in innovative technology to deliver reliable and quality services to our customers. Our consistent investment in our long-standing partnership with Ericsson is a testament to our mutual vision of supporting customers and advancing digital transformation in the country.”

Işıl Yalçın, Vice President and Head of Ericsson Türkiye at Ericsson Middle East and Africa, says: "The Cloud RAN trial with Turkcell strengthens our partnership and reflects our common commitment to propel Türkiye’s digital transformation and innovation goals. Our Cloud RAN solution is designed to provide the flexibility and performance essential for modern networks while improving overall scalability. This trial is in line with Ericsson’s strategy to support our customers in transforming their networks into a platform that will enable new monetization use cases through open APIs. With this Cloud RAN trial deployment, we have demonstrated the potential of the technology to deploy, manage and upgrade Turkcell’s network more dynamically.”  

The partnership between Turkcell and Ericsson builds on a long-standing relationship between Ericsson and Turkcell dating back to 1994. Recently, the companies collaborated on exploring W-band solutions to showcase how the evolution of mobile backhaul can meet the increasing demand for broadband services.