In an exclusive interview, Gilles Garcia, senior director, Wired and Wireless Group at AMD, shares his company’s innovative solutions in the vRAN space and how it can transform telco operations in the Middle East.
Please tell us about AMD’s broad offering for telcos and wireless equipment vendors rolling out 5G vRAN.
AMD telco solutions address the complete radio access network (RAN) and the 5G core, covering the OSS, BSS, 5G core, RAN for CU (centralized unit) and DU (distributed Unit) and radios.
In February 2022, AMD acquired Xilinx – an industry leader in adaptive computing – possessing strong technology support for the radio and the DU acceleration through a specialized portfolio including the AMD Zynq UltraScale+ RFSoC, as well as the AMD T1 and T2 Telco Accelerator Cards.
Combined with the AMD 4th Gen “Genoa” EPYC CPUs, we are offering a complete end-to-end solution for vRAN and wireless radio access networks. Especially, with our latest release of the AMD “Siena” EPYC 8004 processors which is focused on telco operations, we can provide a strong TCO (total cost of ownership) by reducing the power consumption significantly for the CU and DU in the wireless area. With this latest addition, we are expecting to provide complete end-to-end solutions to our customers with a lot of success on the RAN and vRAN applications.
How is AMD addressing the importance of power and energy efficiency for telcos that are rolling out new infrastructure?
Sustainability is very important for the telco world. More and more of our customers and operators are looking for power-efficient solutions to drive their 5G and Edge computing deployments with the highest performance and energy efficiency. Hence, it is critical to deliver technology platforms that can sustain the required performance with minimal power consumption and cost. AMD technology is focused on providing power-efficient solutions for high and low-capacity radios. Our Siena offering is very power efficient and can be compelling for the operators. Our 5G core solutions such as the Genoa processors or Siena can be very efficient on the power side. All in all, it is critical for the operators to have low-power and power-efficient solutions to drive their infrastructure deployments and AMD are fully poised to support that.
What opportunities do you see 5G and vRAN acceleration producing for users and businesses in the Middle East?
The Middle East is a growing area in 5G deployment and is already very strong on the data center side. However, we are seeing the demand from operators to have locally developed technology for RAN and vRAN networks. There is a strong opportunity for us there because we have a high market share on open RAN with the capabilities of our solutions for the radio, accelerator, CU, DU technology platforms. We can provide complete solutions to operators and wireless vendors from the Middle East. We are here to explore and capture those opportunities and work with local wireless vendors and operators to make sure they understand the value proposition we can bring to power efficiency, capacity, and capabilities. We provide the reference designs to the wireless vendor so that they can launch their offerings faster into the market, with strict and compliant open RAN specifications. Moreover, on the accelerator side, it's important to understand that one size does not fit all in the complex wireless environment. There is the requirement of high-capacity radios in some places and lower-capacity radios in others. You need to have the flexibility on the accelerator side to address the different use cases and configurations of radio. This is where AMD can provide innovative solutions on top of the radio and the CU, DU.
We are not incumbents as solution providers for telcos. We come with innovative technology platforms that help drive the 5G deployments and power efficiency across the technology platforms. The presence of AMD at GITEX reflects our vision of the Middle East as a growing market. As an established company, we are here to grow in the Middle East and help and support our customers, now.
