RANsemi unveils 5G Open RAN starter kit to boost speed

RANsemi has announced the launch of its 5G Open RAN Starter Kit, designed to facilitate testing and accelerate the development of 5G Radio Access Networks (RANs).

The starter kit is intended for companies seeking to streamline their 5G projects. It includes all necessary components for an end-to-end 5G network from Core to UE, simplifying the development of Open RAN Radio Unit or Distributed Unit functionality.

Oliver Davies, VP of Marketing at RANsemi, stated, "With the launch of our 5G Open RAN Starter Kit, we are taking a significant step toward democratising 5G system development. It offers a fully configured, optimised private 5G network out-of-the-box, combining ease of use with powerful capabilities, allowing organisations to jumpstart their 5G projects for lab-based evaluation and system demonstrations without the typical complexity and time investment barriers."

The RANsemi Open RAN Starter Kit is a compact O-RAN split 7.2 5G end-to-end system that supports rapid evaluation and deployment of 3GPP 5G NR and O-RAN Alliance-compliant systems. It includes RANsemi SoCs and software and components from SRS, Texas Instruments, and iCana. The platform is designed to meet the diverse requirements of the 5G Open RAN small cell ecosystem and allows companies to customise it according to their needs.

Andy Morris, VP of Customer Engineering at RANsemi, remarked, "Our engineering team designed this platform with flexibility and effectiveness in mind. Whether you're a startup or a major telecom player, this starter kit provides the tools and resources to achieve accelerated success in 5G RAN development and testing."

Ahmed Bader, CEO of MOBiSENSE, shared his positive experience with the kit: "The RANsemi 5G Open RAN Starter Kit has been transformative for our team. It has accelerated our development and testing timelines and opened doors with our potential customers, enabling us to confidently showcase our forthcoming 5G small cell innovations and novel value creation opportunities."

The RANsemi starter kit offers fully integrated and tested components in a band n78 O-RAN split 7.2 topology. It comprises a 5G SA Core, a Centralised Unit, and a Distributed Unit with a RANsemi RNS802 5G High PHY SoC interfaced via an Open Fronthaul eCPRI link to the RANsemi Radio Demonstrator Board. The board features an RF interface connecting commercial handsets or UE test equipment. The kit includes a commercial handset and extra SIM cards, and it features built-in GNSS and PTP synchronisation of all functional units.