NEW DELHI: Japanese telecommunications equipment vendor NEC Corporation has acquired Aspire Technology, an Irish company specializing in open network integration, to strengthen its position in the growing Open Radio Access Network (OpenRAN) sector.
“Aspire Technology provides solutions and services across the full network lifecycle for legacy and open architectures, from 2G to 5G, and will continue to leverage their expertise and experience in the growing open networks and open RAN environment,” reads a joint statement.
The financial details of the transaction were not disclosed. The acquisition is expected to be completed in July 2022 after proper approval, the statement said.
NEC is already active in the OpenRAN ecosystem and provides hardware, software and systems integration services to some of the leading global telcoes such as NTT DoCoMo, Rakuten Mobile, Deutsche Telekom and Vodafone, which are the forerunners in accepting disaggregated networks.
Earlier in January this year, NEC also acquired Citizens Band Radio Service / 4G / 5G provider Blue Danube Systems to strengthen its position as an OpenRAN player in the North American market.
“The strong capabilities and deep pool of talented engineers at Aspire Technology, combined with their portfolio of technology solutions and applications, are a major step forward for our NEC Open Networks strategy. NEC is now better prepared than any provider to integrate disaggregated network components into a well-tuned ecosystem, ”said Naohisa Matsuda, General Manager of NEC’s 5G Strategy and Business.
“Interest and acceptance of Open Radio Access Network (RAN) has continued to expand along with its potential to transform networks with the prospect of open hardware, software and interfaces for interoperable, cellular wireless networks,” Jabil said.
“We believe that the combination of NEC and Aspire Technology will offer tremendous benefits to our customers, both existing network-based and those evolving into the more open environment, and also for the broader 5G and Open RAN market, which is growing rapidly.” Bill Walsh, founder and CEO of Aspire Technology, added.
According to recent survey findings by US contract maker Jabil, 57% of telecommunications stakeholders or executives believe that OpenRAN will be ready for widespread deployment with 5G within the next two years.
The respondents surveyed believe that OpenRAN will reduce capital and operating costs (Capex / Opex).