Viavi Solutions said it’s working with China Mobile to support the mobile giant’s deployment of 5G services in China by the end of 2019.
In a statement, Viavi said the Chinese mobile giant has selected the firm to provide test and measurement hardware and software to support the development of Slicing Packet Network (SPN) with FlexE interface that China Mobile is developing for 5G transport.
"Viavi has been honored to collaborate with China Mobile on analyzing 5G network scenarios and proposing technology strategy. In order to realize China Mobile's vision of introducing 5G service by the end of 2019, principal technologies including SPN for transport must be standardized by the ITU-T,” said Oleg Khaykin, president and chief executive officer of Viavi Solutions.
“We have advanced our test technology to meet this objective, and our solutions are ready to support the China Mobile ecosystem of partners to deliver interoperable network infrastructure."
Through its extensive analysis of 5G transport network requirements, China Mobile has found that SPN is an optimal technology to support next-generation architecture, bandwidth, traffic model, network slicing, latency and time synchronization.
Flexible Ethernet or FlexE is used in conjunction with SPN to create smaller Ethernet channels from a larger one, or vice versa, to guarantee quality of service (QoS) and isolation between slices at the transport layer. China Mobile has requested that the ITU undertake standardization of SPN.
Viavi said it will deliver an SPN test platform to lay a common foundation for network equipment manufacturers, chip developers and transceiver vendors to validate products based on this technology.
China Mobile, the world’s largest mobile carrier by subscribers, had earlier announced plans to launch pre-commercial trials in 2019 before a commercial launch in 2020.
The announcement by Viavi Solution hints that China Mobile will beat original 2020 target, joining several other mobile carriers, including AT&T, SK Telecom, in launching 5G in 2019.