Originally posted VMware Blogs by David Lawrence and Shogo Kobayashi
Communication service providers (CSPs) are rapidly evolving their networks to accelerate 5G deployments. To do so, they’re using VMware Telco Cloud Platform as a flexible foundation to manage the ever-changing telco landscape. The path to a modern 5G network requires innovation throughout the network but especially in the core.
Together, NEC and VMware have partnered to accelerate CSPs’ 5G core innovation. Recently certified through the VMware Ready for Telco Cloud program, NEC’s cloud-native 4G/5G Converged Core enables CSPs to shorten time to market, boost network monetization, and improve flexibility and scalability.
NEC and VMware Combined Solution
With more than 25 years of experience in Mobile Packet Core technology, NEC has been selected by multiple CSPs to enable a smooth migration to 5G. NEC’s highly flexible 4G/5G Converged Core, with full automation for dynamic scaling and auto-healing, speeds up operations and time to market without disrupting the existing 4G core. NEC’s 4G/5G Converged Core is fully virtualized and containerized.
VMware Telco Cloud Platform is powered by field-proven compute and networking coupled with VMware Telco Cloud Automation, which unites and optimizes multi-cloud resources to reduce operational complexity. The cloud-smart automation of VMware Telco Cloud Automation empowers you to rapidly launch services at scale. The combined solution ensures telco-grade resiliency and service availability, delivers web-scale speed and agility, and accelerates your ability to bring innovative services to market.
NEC’s 4G/5G Converged Packet Core running on VMware Telco Cloud Platform deploys containerized network functions without disruption, ensuring telco-grade resiliency, service availability, and cloud economics.
Figure 1: NEC’s 4G/5G Converged Core on VMware Telco Cloud Platform
NEC Network Functions Certified by the VMware Ready for Telco Cloud Program
NEC’s cloud-native 4G/5G Converged Core portfolio features a full set of 3GPP-compliant network functions for 4G and 5G. The following network functions have been certified by the VMware Ready for Telco Cloud program.
| Network Function | Description |
| AMF | The AMF is one of the key functions in the control plane in 5G core and responsible for the access and mobility management of mobile subscribers. It is the point of contact for all mobile users in the core network. It maintains connections with the radio access network (RAN) to transport signaling messages to and from users. |
| NSSF | The NSSF is a main node that realizes network slicing function. Network slicing of the 5G core virtually isolates a network layer to satisfy a variety of communication requirements in a single core network. |
| SMF | The SMF provides session management functions within a 5G core network. At the highest level, it controls the creation, modification, and deletion of PDU sessions for individual subscribers, providing data access from the UE to one or more Data Network Names (DNNs). |
| NRF | The NRF is a network function that resolves its NF service instance for the 5G core service-based interface. In addition, NRF manages available NF service instances based on each NF service instance registration and monitoring. |
| AUSF+UDM | The Authentication Server Function (AUSF) is a network function for 3GPP access. AUSF interacts with AMF and gives authentication to UE. Unified Data Management (UDM) is a function that manages authentication data and subscription data. UDM uses Unified Data Repository (UDR), which stores authentication data and subscription data. |
The solution verification and certifications by the VMware Ready for Telco Cloud program reduce implementation risks, deployment times, and errors during customer rollouts. Together, NEC and VMware are helping CSPs deploy network functions and enhance the efficiency of resource utilization while improving scalability.
Collaboration Powers Modernization
VMware and NEC are helping CSPs modernize their networks with a smooth and seamless migration from 4G to 5G by accommodating both 4G and 5G users under NEC’s 4G/5G Converged Core.
NEC and VMware continue to collaborate to accelerate time to market, enable network monetization, and enhance flexibility, scalability, and reliability.
Check out the NEC network functions in VMware Marketplace. The following functions are VMware Telco Cloud Platform 2.2 certified 5G core solutions: