After joining forces with Google for the software side of its new ‘Jio Phone’, Mukesh Ambani’s Reliance Jio has quietly announced a new alliance with Dutch semiconductor major, NXP Semiconductors. The alliance has been forged to implement a 5G NR O-RAN small cell solution that would be incorporating NXP’s Layerscape multicore processors.
The solution would power new RAN networks which would deliver high performance, enabling a varied range of 5G use cases for broadband access as well as Industry 4.0 and IoT (Internet-of-Things) applications, including telemedicine, tele-education, augmented/virtual reality, drone-based agricultural monitoring and more.
The 5G NR solutions have already been tested successfully at 100MHz channel bandwidth in the 3.5GHz spectrum, with peak data rates of over 1Gb/s, according to a press release by NXP. “This translates to increased performance for a wide range of segments, enabling innovative applications in smart cities, smart homes, health, and education, and significantly enhanced user experience in data download rates for all mobile users,” the release read.
It added that the 5G NR radio solutions were well-positioned for the next-generation RAN networks and would provide increased indoor and outdoor performance while enabling new 5G use cases.
Jio may be a relatively new player in the market, but it has rapidly evolved into India’s largest mobile network operator and the third-largest in the world, beating well-established names like Airtel and Vodafone. As for NXP, the Dutch firm is one of the biggest suppliers of computing chips to automakers. An alliance between two of the most powerful names in the market is sure to send waves across the industry.
According to Aayush Bhatnagar, senior vice president of Jio Platforms, Jio had developed state-of-the-art radio products with NXP, which were compliant with the 3GPP as well as to the O-RAN standards. He added that they had a history of close collaboration with NXP and looked forward to strengthening it further.
“The NXP processor platform is an important component of Jio’s 5G journey. 5G New Radio solutions require flexibility in terms of the platform features, efficiency, and rich tooling, which NXP brings to the table,” he said.
“The collaboration with Jio to develop, test and deploy 5G solutions underscores the power of our Layerscape products and the growing ability of NXP’s antenna-to-processor portfolio to accelerate new 5G deployments,” said Tareq Bustami, senior vice president and general manager, Network Edge at NXP Semiconductors. “Jio and NXP are both focused on technology and innovation leadership, and this combined systems integration demonstrates our shared vision to deliver efficient 5G NR solutions to the India market.”
