Abstract
5G and its evolution towards 6G is unlocking new use cases that will require the reconsideration of the existing network architectures and its operation. As the network will be required to support new service types and radio protocol splits, the traditional physical point to point connections will need to be replaced with a transport network up to the antenna site to guarantee low latency services and high bandwidth. Optical based transport is a key enabler to realize such a convergent network, where the traditional fixed infrastructure in use for mobile services and mobile infrastructure should also support enterprises services. The Software Defined Network (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) technology plays a key role to evolve towards digitalization. It allows to simplify the creation of new services and to implement a real decoupling between the infrastructure and the network functions that run virtually, on generic processing units located everywhere in the network. Supporting automation is a key requirement that traditional optical technology is not able to meet. In this paper the reference scenarios for the access network are presented with the analysis of their requirements and the enabling optical solutions based on integrated silicon photonics.
Highlights
To comply with low latency use cases, some mobile core network functions need to move to the access
The evolution to 5G and beyond promotes novel technologies for the network such as Software Defined Network (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV) that allow a decoupling between the hardware resources and the services
The low latency requirements of the E2E services has enabled the replacement of big data centers located in regional area with smaller ones located near the access
Summary
To comply with low latency use cases, some mobile core network functions need to move to the access. In addition to 5G and IoT, other technologies, such as the Software Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualization (NFV), will contribute to deeply transform the business of new digitalized industries. As soon as industries introduce virtualized and software-defined infrastructure to expand their business in the digital economy, network automation will become essential to re-scale and re-purpose their operations. The access network segment will require higher bandwidth and lower latency than today, and a higher level of automation, comparable with that of the other segments. Today optical communication technology can meet in principle high bandwidth and low latency requirements, an enhanced level of automation is needed to enable the realization of networks that are managed E2E automatically as “one network”.
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