- News
- September 16, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Airtel platform backed by IBM Cloud Satellite will power Maruti Suzuki’s initiatives to streamline plant productivity and quality operations
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Telco Cloud
Telco cloud refers to the cloud-native infrastructure operators use to run network functions as software, rather than on dedicated hardware — spanning private clouds, public-cloud partnerships, and hybrid models. It is the foundation for virtualized cores, cloud-native RAN, automation, and the agility 5G standalone demands. A defining trend is the deepening relationship between operators and hyperscalers, who increasingly host or support network workloads, raising strategic questions about control, cost, and dependency. For operators, telco cloud strategy shapes how flexible, scalable, and cost-efficient their networks can be; for vendors and hyperscalers, it’s a major battleground. This channel covers telco cloud across private, public, and hybrid models — cloud-native network functions, operator-hyperscaler partnerships, and the platforms involved — with analysis of how cloud is reshaping operator architecture, economics, and competitive dynamics.
- Article & Insights
- September 16, 2022
- Hema Kadia
What is a telco cloud? How is the difference between telco and IT cloud? What are the industry solutions to migrate to telco cloud? Who are the leading telco and IT cloud vendors? What are their solution offerings and strategies? How can telcos successfully migrate to telco cloud?
- Podcast
- September 15, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Dive deep into the evolution of 5G network slicing, exploring its management innovations, real-world integrations, scalability challenges, and its transformative potential for both service providers and enterprises with Aarna Networks and Kaloom.
- Article & Insights
- September 15, 2022
- Hema Kadia
In a world where operator budgets are squeezed, and the personnel required to keep up with the demand for services, operators are streamlining their network operations to manage OPEX and CAPEX. Therefore, finding a way to keep pace with customer expectations and monitor the network efficiently is becoming more and more imperative.
- Article & Insights
- September 14, 2022
- Hema Kadia
With 5G and Edge computing, there is an explosion of management complexity because there are hundreds of software instances (that include edge applications and private 5G applications), tens of thousands of edge locations, and tens of infrastructure providers. Existing approaches and solutions are not able to adequately scale to address this complexity.
- Article & Insights
- September 11, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Aether™ is ONF’s Enterprise-5G/LTE-Edge-Cloud-as-a-Service system. Aether provides mobile connectivity and edge cloud services for distributed enterprise networks, all provisioned and managed from a centralized cloud.
- Article & Insights
- September 11, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Telco 5G network & IT teams are under pressure to deliver applications and services faster, out-maneuver competitors, and provide exceptional user experiences while facing tighter budgets and a severe lack of cloud specialist skills. While the move to cloud-native network operations is relatively new for operators, it’s old hat for enterprises and web/hyper-scalers.
- Article & Insights
- September 11, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Who are the global top 12 telco cloud and IT cloud computing vendors? What are their offerings and strategies for enabling telco cloudification?
- Article & Insights
- September 10, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Nephio is Kubernetes-based intent-driven automation of network functions and the underlying infrastructure that supports those functions.
- Article & Insights
- September 10, 2022
- Hema Kadia
The Dickensian duality succinctly characterizes where we are with 5G — pushing towards monetization is challenging, commercially-available network slicing is fledgling at best, but 5G promises rewards for those enterprising and persistent.
- Article & Insights
- September 10, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Earlier telecommunication systems were proprietary and purpose-built systems developed on a monolithic architecture. These systems ensured that telcos or enterprise entities were struck in a vendor lock-in model, scaling up on different telco-grade applications was time-sensitive, and innovation and automation depended on strategies adopted by OEMs. But time has shown us how telecommunication systems have fundamentally changed and evolved for good.
- News
- August 20, 2022
- Hema Kadia
Adani Data Networks Ltd, the Adani Group subsidiary, will start with 5G services in six service areas and use the spectrum for data center businesses.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is ‘Telco Cloud,’ and how is it different from regular cloud computing?
Telco Cloud refers to cloud computing infrastructure specifically built or adapted to run telecom network functions, distinguishing it from general-purpose public cloud platforms that businesses across many industries use for ordinary computing needs like web hosting or data storage. The key difference is that telecom network functions often have far stricter requirements around latency, reliability, and real-time performance than typical enterprise cloud workloads, since a delay or failure in a network function can directly disrupt live calls, data sessions, or critical infrastructure services for potentially millions of subscribers simultaneously. Telco Cloud platforms are engineered specifically to meet these more demanding requirements, whether built by traditional telecom vendors, run on a major public cloud provider’s infrastructure, or some hybrid combination of both approaches.
Why are major hyperscalers like AWS, Microsoft, and Google increasingly involved in Telco Cloud?
Major hyperscalers have increasingly built telecom-specific offerings, like Microsoft’s Azure for Operators and Google Cloud’s telecom-focused infrastructure, recognizing that operators represent a substantial, largely untapped customer base for cloud computing services beyond the hyperscalers’ traditional enterprise customer base. For operators, partnering with an established hyperscaler can reduce the cost and complexity of building and maintaining their own data center infrastructure from scratch, while gaining access to the hyperscaler’s broader expertise in cloud computing and AI infrastructure. This represents a notable shift in industry dynamics, since these partnerships position hyperscalers as increasingly important infrastructure partners, a role traditionally filled almost entirely by telecom-specific equipment vendors like Ericsson, Nokia, and Huawei.
What does the shift from ‘cloud-native’ to ‘AI-native’ infrastructure actually mean?
The shift from cloud-native to AI-native describes infrastructure designed from the ground up to run AI workloads efficiently alongside traditional network functions, rather than treating AI as a separate, bolted-on capability running on infrastructure originally designed purely for conventional network functions. This involves incorporating specialized AI-optimized hardware, like GPUs, directly into the telco cloud platform’s design, and building software architectures specifically capable of supporting increasingly autonomous AI agents that can monitor and manage network operations directly. Industry vendors, including Huawei with its TICC and AgenticCore platforms, have specifically marketed offerings around this AI-native framing, positioning it as the next meaningful evolution of telco cloud architecture beyond the original cloud-native virtualization shift.
What challenges do operators face when migrating network functions to Telco Cloud?
Migrating network functions to telco cloud infrastructure presents several recurring challenges. Ensuring virtualized functions actually meet the strict performance and reliability requirements telecom services demand requires careful testing and validation, since a function that performs adequately in a general-purpose cloud environment might not automatically meet the more demanding latency standards telecom-grade services require. Integration across multiple cloud environments and vendors, particularly for operators using a mix of their own infrastructure and one or more hyperscaler partnerships, adds meaningful operational complexity. There’s also a workforce dimension, since network engineering teams historically focused on managing dedicated hardware need different skills to effectively manage cloud-based, software-defined infrastructure.
How does Telco Cloud relate to Open RAN and network slicing?
Telco Cloud provides the underlying computing infrastructure that both Open RAN and network slicing depend on to actually function in practice. Open RAN’s disaggregated, multi-vendor radio network components frequently run as software on telco cloud infrastructure rather than dedicated hardware, meaning a robust telco cloud platform is often a practical prerequisite for a successful Open RAN deployment. Network slicing similarly depends on telco cloud’s flexible, virtualized infrastructure to actually create and manage multiple distinct virtual networks running on shared physical resources, since the dynamic resource allocation slicing requires is fundamentally a cloud computing capability rather than something a fixed, dedicated hardware architecture could practically support at the same level of flexibility.
What’s a concrete example of an AI-native telco cloud platform in deployment today?
Huawei’s TICC, short for Telecom Intelligent Cloud Core, and its accompanying AgenticCore platform represent a concrete example of vendors building infrastructure specifically designed to support autonomous AI agents managing network operations directly, alongside more traditional virtualized network functions, on shared underlying infrastructure. These platforms are designed to support increasingly sophisticated AI capabilities, including agents that can independently monitor network performance, predict and respond to emerging issues, and make operational adjustments with less direct human oversight than earlier generations of network management software required. While still relatively early in broader commercial deployment, these AI-native offerings reflect the direction major telecom equipment vendors are actively pushing their telco cloud product lines toward.
Do operators build their own Telco Cloud infrastructure, or rely entirely on vendors?
It varies considerably by operator and specific use case. Some larger, well-resourced operators build and maintain significant portions of their own telco cloud infrastructure internally, often using open-source software frameworks and components from multiple vendors rather than relying entirely on a single external provider. Others rely more heavily on partnerships with hyperscalers like Microsoft or Google, or with telecom equipment vendors offering pre-packaged telco cloud platforms, particularly for capabilities like AI infrastructure where building genuinely competitive internal capability from scratch would require substantial investment. Many operators ultimately pursue a hybrid approach, maintaining direct control over certain core, mission-critical infrastructure while relying on external partners for less differentiating capabilities.
What role does Red Hat and open-source software play in Telco Cloud?
Red Hat, primarily through its OpenShift platform and broader open-source software portfolio, has become a significant player in telco cloud infrastructure, providing operators and telecom equipment vendors with an open-source foundation for building and running virtualized network functions rather than relying entirely on proprietary, vendor-specific software stacks. This open-source approach appeals to operators partly because it reduces dependency on any single proprietary vendor’s specific technology stack, and partly because it benefits from a broader community of contributors across the technology industry beyond telecom specifically. Several major telecom equipment vendors and operators have built their own telco cloud offerings on top of Red Hat’s open-source foundation, reflecting how significant open-source software has become as an underlying building block for telco cloud infrastructure broadly.
