UfiSpace's New DCSG Combines Disaggregation and Convergence to Improve Mobile Backhaul TCO

By Will Chang

As more and more 5G services are launched, the next challenge would be maximizing revenue from these services. While there is a lot of exploration looking for potential applications to monetize with 5G, a more practical approach would be to lower the total cost of ownership. And with many that starts with disaggregating the mobile backhaul. 

The mobile backhaul is an essential part of the network that connects the radio access network to the core network, allowing various types of traffic (voice, video, text and data) to be transmitted in between as part of a telecommunication service.
 

Disaggregation improves a network’s TCO

Disaggregation allows service providers have choices adopting various NOS (Network Operating System) and applications on bare metal switches and enable versatile services with the same hardware platform. UfiSpace’s S9500-22XST is such a platform. It is a disaggregated cell site gateway with many use cases to lower TCO. 

For example, a wireless transport could utilize the S9500-22XST as radio aware indoor unit and build a wireless backhaul solution. With the same platform, they can provide an application like customer edge or provider edge to aggregate traffic from enterprise or residential broadband just by running another NOS.
 

Convergence is another way improve a network’s TCO

The cell site gateway is a highly geographic and application dependent box. On one end, it faces multiple generations of RAN technologies and on the other end, it has to deal with all kinds of BBU interfaces. Additionally, enterprise and residential broadband could also pass through the same point on the service provider’s backbone network. With a single UfiSpace S9500-22XST disaggregated cell site gateway, a service provider can converge all that traffic into the 5G mobile backhaul. 



Another use case for the S9500-22XST would be in the 5G private network. A 5G private network is a miniature RAN solution to provide regional service. Like the public RAN, an aggregation router would be needed in front of or behind the BBU, but the scale would be smaller. With the versatility of private 5G configurations, a lightweight but full feature router is needed to offers cost effective solution to play different roles such as BBU aggregation (backhaul), RRU aggregation (fronthaul), or even act as T-GM or T-BC to synchronize devices across the network. 

So, whether TCO is lowered by disaggregation or converging networks, the UfiSpace S9500-22XST can do it all. Service providers have choices between rich solutions in the eco-system and are able to adopt right solution with right price for the infrastructure. They can also converge wired and wireless access networks to better utilize network infrastructure and provide a more unified service to their customers.
 

What's the difference between the S9500-22XST and the S9500-30XST?

The UfiSpace S9500-22XST is based on the same platform as the S9500-30XS, the industry’s first live deployment of a disaggregated cell site gateway. We can say S9500-22XST is a lite version of S9500-30XS that can further reduce TCO as well as power consumption. All the key features are identical including Intel Broadwell 4-core 1.5GHz CPU, Broadcom Qumran-AX switching ASIC, 100GE uplink and full timing features support. Therefore, NOS vendors could easily integrate two boxes without extra effort and be able to offer versatile services to their customers. 

The major difference between S9500-22XST and S9500-30XS is that S9500-22XST supports 1GE RJ45 interfaces which makes it the best solution to converge multiple access networks from legacy RAN to 5G RAN as well as fixed broadband service.