Rakuten Symphony is expanding its operations across the UK, France and Germany as it attempts to make it easier for partners to deliver open mobile communications connectivity.
The expansion will allow the company to better support the business operations of mobile operators and vendors in Europe, who are looking to deliver services around Open RAN (radio access network) technologies.
Open RAN allows providers to mix-and-match different pieces of mobile network hardware and software to deliver cheaper and more flexible services, instead of relying on single solutions from the likes of Nokia, Ericsson, Huawei or Samsung, for instance.
Rakuten Symphony says its wider operations in key European markets will create “attractive hubs” for the next generation of European tech talent to develop “advanced and innovative technologies”.
“Mobile network operators and governments in Europe are incredibly open to the opportunities Open RAN technologies can bring to the region,” said Tareq Amin, CEO of Rakuten Symphony. “We’re expanding our operations to strengthen our research and development capabilities, and will collaborate closely with European operators, vendors, governments and academic institutions to help realise our vision of providing a future-proof, cost-effective, cloud-based connectivity platform to transform the delivery of telecoms services.”
Rakuten Symphony UK, based in London, is focused on 4G and 5G Open RAN software and hardware development and testing, leveraging and expanding recently acquired Altiostar Networks’ R&D centre and Open RAN engineering lab in the country. The expansion of R&D in the UK will put Rakuten Symphony in an “ideal position”, it said, to support the UK government in meeting its ambition for 35% of mobile network traffic in the country to be carried over open and interoperable RAN architectures by 2030.
In France, Rakuten will establish a company unit to lead local sales efforts for products, services and solutions in the country. Based in Paris, the unit will draw on talent from an existing technology centre in Montpellier.
The vendor is also expanding commercial efforts from its Dusseldorf, Germany unit, and is now on a recruitment drive in the country.
Rakuten Symphony is headquartered in Japan and has a local presence in the US, Singapore, India and EMEA.
