Held in London on 12^th February, the annual Ericsson pre-MWC meeting was well attended with more than 300 media and industry analysts. One of the main messages was about leveraging open and programmable AI-driven networks to create differentiated connectivity solutions and service infrastructure to enable new services and revenue opportunities.

Key highlights/announcements included:

• 𝐆𝐥𝐨𝐛𝐚𝐥 𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐬 𝐏𝐥𝐚𝐭𝐟𝐨𝐫𝐦 (𝐆𝐂𝐏) 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐀𝐝𝐮𝐧𝐚 – network API was a major theme at the event with Ericsson positioning its Vonage GCP as a key platform for selling APIs to enterprises. Aduna, a joint-venture company set up by Ericsson and 13 major MNOs last year, is tasked with accelerating the development of a network API ecosystem. KDDI was confirmed as the 13th MNO at the event.

Key objectives of Aduna are to bring “massive simplification” of network APIs to developers and ensure network APIs are consumable. Commercial partners will be announced at MWC.

• 𝐂𝐫𝐚𝐝𝐥𝐞𝐩𝐨𝐢𝐧𝐭 𝐗20 – a 5G router to provide differentiated FWA services together with network slicing capabilities was announced at the event. Ericsson believes that FWA's potential is underestimated and is rethinking how to monetise FWA via more differentiated services.

• 𝐒𝐌𝐎 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐫𝐀𝐩𝐩𝐬 – Ericsson is developing a horizontal, “multi-vendor” Service Management and Orchestration (SMO) platform that will offer a mix of rApps developed by Ericsson, MNOs and third-party companies. Around 44 ecosystem partners have signed up. A developer portal has already been set up with plans for an rApps developer conference in June. Partners on-stage included Saratoga-based gen AI company 𝐀𝐢𝐫𝐚 𝐓𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐧𝐨𝐥𝐨𝐠𝐢𝐞𝐬 and mobile messaging company 𝐒𝐢𝐧𝐜𝐡.

• 𝐏𝐫𝐢𝐯𝐚𝐭𝐞 𝐧𝐞𝐭𝐰𝐨𝐫𝐤𝐬 – an interesting session with car OEM 𝐉𝐚𝐠𝐮𝐚𝐫 𝐋𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐑𝐨𝐯𝐞𝐫, which has installed an Ericsson 5G-based private network solution at its car plant in the UK. JLR is on a mission to “cut-the-copper” and create a more agile and innovative manufacturing environment. As well as providing much-enhanced connectivity compared to Ethernet, the network provides access to lots of sensor data previously inaccessible via other connectivity solutions. Using AI, this data is being leveraged to improve plant performance.

• 𝐎𝐩𝐞𝐧 𝐑𝐀𝐍 – Ericsson announced that around 130 of its radio products are now open RAN “supporting” and estimates that around two-thirds of all radios shipped will be open RAN “supporting” by end 2025.

AT&T plans to install open RAN radios from Fujitsu and Mavenir on its Ericsson network before the end of the year. However, these are likely to be small cell and non-massive MIMO radios. The operator estimates that around 70% of its traffic will be via open interfaces by 2026.

• New radio products – there was a crop of seven new radios, together with antennas and a new portfolio called Ericsson RAN Connect, a new fronthaul unit designed to enable operators to aggregate more radio traffic to the fronthaul point. It also supports migration to Cloud RAN migration. Flagship models included:

• AIR 3266 - a wideband massive MIMO radio with 400W output, weighing 17kg, which will be available in Q2/Q3 2026.

• Air 4455 - an advanced FDD radio with new wideband PAs, dual band FDD with 4x100W output power weighing 19kg (weight reduction of 20%). Availability expected in Q4 2025.

• AIR 3285 – a dual band FDD massive MIMO radio weighing 30kg, the lightest in class. Also available Q4 2025.