By Nojeed Gandour, Correspondent Egypt
Umniah Jordan has announced its partnership with Ericsson with a new contract covering the transformation of its radio access network (RAN) infrastructure in Jordan. This extended partnership will optimize the subscriber experience for both consumers and enterprises. The agreement covers hardware, software and range of services such as network management, system integration and support. It also covers the transformation of existing 4G infrastructure in order to cater for the increased consumer demand on connectivity.
Umniah Chief Executive Officer, Ziad Shatara says: “The upcoming transformation of our networks is in line with our commitment supporting innovation and development in Jordan’s telecommunications sector. Through this partnership with Ericsson, we take a new step in meeting the demand for mobile broadband connectivity and services by consumers and enterprises and make our network even more efficient in handling data traffic and ensuring better quality of experience to our customers.”
Ericsson will provide equipment from the Ericsson Radio System family that are flexible to changing demands with multi-band and multi-layer technology. This will enable energy-efficient and cost-effective operations while allowing Umniah to meet growing subscriber demands for better and faster mobile internet connectivity.
President of Ericsson Middle East and Africa, Fadi Pharaon says: “Today’s agreement is a testament of Umniah’s trust in our technology and market leadership, enabling us to gain additional market position with Umniah and in Jordan. We look forward to drive this new partnership to success by rolling-out new networks in the Kingdom and supporting to build the telecommunications local infrastructure.”
Ericsson Radio System delivers the industry’s leading energy efficient and compact radio solution, while maintaining performance leadership. The flexibility inherent in the architecture is made possible by targeted software deployment, which enables fast and efficient rollout of new capabilities by future-proof and sustainable networks.
Ericsson 5G Core and transport technologies fully compliant with 3GPP/GSMA NESAS security standards
An independent audit has confirmed full compliance of Ericsson 5G Core and transport technology development processes with new 3GPP/GSMA Network Security Assurance Schemes (NESAS) standards. Ericsson’s radio technology development processes were successfully audited in 2020.
The heightened value, scale and complex security challenges of emerging 5G enterprise use cases across industries such as manufacturing, ICT, public services, logistics and transport continue to underline the criticality of industry-wide security assurance within the product development lifecycle of mobile technologies.
The Network Equipment Security Assurance Scheme (NESAS), jointly defined by global standards organizations 3GPP and GSMA, was introduced in recent years to provide a common security assurance framework for secure product development and product lifecycle processes across the mobile industry. It uses 3GPP-defined security test cases for security evaluation of network equipment.
Security has long been fundamental to the research, design and development of Ericsson 5G Core and central to all Ericsson products and solutions, including the suite of mobile transport technologies. This was confirmed recently with the full audit of NESAS standard compliance for Ericsson 5G Core and transport technology development processes, in addition to Ericsson’s Radio Access Network processes which was successfully audited in 2020.
The full compliance of Ericsson 5G Core includes the audit of products: Ericsson’s Packet Core Gateway, Packet Core Controller, SGSN-MME, Cloud Core Subscription Manager, Cloud Core Exposure Server, Cloud Core Data-Storage Manager, Cloud Core Resource Controller and Service-Aware Policy Controller.
The audit is for the development processes followed for Ericsson’s implementation as specified by 3GPP. Ericsson’s implementation of these enumerated 3GPP network functions is achieved through products developed by the Packet Core product development unit and the Unified Data Management & Policy product development unit – part of the Ericsson Business Area Digital Services.
Ericsson Transport product portfolio focuses on providing high quality, reliable and secure communication channel for 5G networks and services. Continuous evolution of security aware processes is an integrated part of Ericsson Transport product development. Specific transport development processes were successfully audited including the Fronthaul 6000, MINI-LINK 6000, and Router 6000 portfolios.
Head of R&D Portfolio and Strategy, Digital Services, Ericsson, David Bjore says: “We are pleased to add our 5G Core and transport technology suite to our portfolio of NESAS-compliant technology development processes. 5G networks will create a multi-trillion-dollar socio-economic impact in coming years which rightly makes network security a critical criterion for communications services providers, enterprises and national governments.”
He adds: “As such, the trustworthiness of our mobile technologies, and security assurance frameworks such as compliance with the NESAS standard, will continue to serve as the bedrock of our standardization and regulatory efforts, product design and implementation considerations, and research activities.”
Ericsson’s NESAS compliance processes underwent a complete audit by a GSMA-approved, independent auditor.
