News Release
KDDI Uses Wind River Studio for O-RAN–Compliant 5G Virtualized Base Station

Wind River Studio has been launched in KDDI’s commercial network

ALAMEDA, CA — Feb. 22, 2022 — Wind River®, a global leader in delivering software for mission-critical intelligent systems, today announced that KDDI Corporation (KDDI) has used Wind River Studio for its O-RAN–compliant 5G stand-alone virtualized base station technology, which has recently launched on its commercial network.

“5G opens up new opportunities, with greater intelligence and compute moving toward the edges of the network. Much of our future will be run on a virtualized, distributed cloud with low-latency, far edge cloud architecture to support new use cases in the new intelligent machine economy,” said Paul Miller, Chief Technology Officer, Wind River. “We are able to provide solutions to help prepare for a cloud-native future and deliver on high-reliability, ultra-low-latency, and highly efficient solutions for next-generation networks.”

Wind River is a leader in the early 5G landscape, powering the majority of 5G RAN deployments with operators such as Verizon and Vodafone, and its Wind River Studio capabilities address service providers’ complex challenge of deploying and managing a physically distributed, ultra-low-latency cloud-native infrastructure.

“We are pleased to announce that we have developed a 5G virtualized base station that complies with the O-RAN standard and has launched on our commercial network. KDDI aims to provide customers advanced communication services with flexibility and speed that meet usage needs with open and virtualize base stations. KDDI will continue to lead the development of innovative network technologies and provide customers with safe and secure communications and new value-added experiences,” said Kazuyuki Yoshimura, Chief Technology Officer, KDDI Corporation.

“We are pleased to support KDDI in launching its O-RAN–compliant 5G virtualized base station for its commercial network,” said Chisa Nakata, President, Wind River Japan. “Wind River has built a domestic support structure to serve the diverse needs of the telecommunications industry. We will continue to support our customers’ success as a trusted partner.”

The growth of 5G, AI, automation, and cloud-native technologies has opened new possibilities for applications at the far edge, such as robotics, drones, and autonomous vehicles. Recent research from Forbes finds that 90% of telecom leaders believe more than 50% of their offerings will need to work on the far edge cloud within less than three years.1

Wind River Studio provides a cloud-native platform for the development, deployment, operations, and servicing of mission-critical intelligent systems. Its cloud infrastructure capabilities include a fully cloud-native, Kubernetes- and container-based architecture, based on the StarlingX open source project, for distributed edge networks at scale. Addressing the complexities of deploying and managing cloud-native vRAN infrastructure, Studio delivers a foundation for a geographically distributed, managed solution able to simplify Day 1 and Day 2 operations by providing single-pane-of-glass, zero touch automated management of thousands of nodes, no matter their physical location.

More information about Wind River Studio is available at www.windriver.com/studio.

About Wind River

Wind River is a global leader in delivering software for mission-critical intelligent systems. For 40 years, the company has been an innovator and pioneer, powering billions of devices and systems that require the highest levels of security, safety, and reliability.   Wind River software and expertise are accelerating digital transformation across industries, including automotive, aerospace, defense, industrial, medical, and telecommunications. The company offers a comprehensive portfolio supported by world-class professional services and support and a broad partner ecosystem. To learn more, visit Wind River at www.windriver.com.

About KDDI

KDDI is telecommunication service provider in Japan, offering both mobile and fixed-line communications. With its well-established base of over 60 million customers, and through mobile services and shops offering its “au,” “UQ mobile,” “povo” brand, KDDI is expanding its services into the “Life Design” business, which includes e-commerce, fintech, nationwide electric power utility services, entertainment, and education. With a 60-year history, KDDI is now focusing on creating smart infrastructure through IoT technologies and open innovation with partners and start-up companies in diverse industries. KDDI is accelerating the global growth of its telecommunications consumer business with operations in Myanmar and Mongolia, and in the global ICT business with the “TELEHOUSE” brand. KDDI (TYO:9433) is listed on the Tokyo Stock Exchange. https://www.kddi.com/english/

1 Forbes/Wind River, “Characteristics of Intelligent Systems,” 2021

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