China Mobile, Huawei Demonstrate Microservice 5G Network

China Mobile and Huawei have jointly demonstrated the first microservice-based 5G core network built on top of service-based architecture.

The demonstration at Mobile World Congress 2018 in Barcelona followed the joint release of an SBA-based 5G core network prototype at Mobile World Congress Shanghai 2017.

The concept behind the microservice-based network is a belief that 5G core network software architecure needs to be broken down into microservices to exploit the structural advantage of service-based network functions, interfaces and operation.

Huawei said the design is based on the concept of slice-as-a-service, whereby microservices are designed on demand and can then be flexibly deployed, with scaling and upgrades applied independently for each microservice.

“SBA is maturing and will definitely be deployed commercially. Huawei's microservice-based 5G core network helps carriers implement agile operation, with functions arranged and resources defined on demand,” Huawei GM of 5G core networks Felix Qiu said.

“Huawei will continue to collaborate with China Mobile and partners to launch a commercial microservice-based 5G network at the earliest possible time."

Separately ZTE has released a 2G/3G/4G/5G fully integrated common core solution based on the 3GPP Release 15 service-based architecture (SBA) standard.

The cloud-native common core integrates all kinds of accessing modes including fixed-mobile convergence in the network functions and network services layer.

All services address the demand for self-contained, reusable and self-managed capabilities. It is designed to allow operators to avoid multiple upgrades of wireless and core networks.