The commercial deployment completed end-to-end 5G voice and data calls with Nokia’s 5G Cloud RAN solution including its AirScale Massive MIMO radios, baseband software, and AI-powered MantaRay network management solution.

"Elisa used Dell XR8620 servers as well as Red Hat OpenShift to support cloud-native RAN functions across the network," Nokia said in its announcement.

"By integrating with Red Hat OpenShift, service providers have the option to scale their 5G network footprint and quickly introduce new services.

"The deployment verified areas such as capacity, performance, features, life cycle management, automation, and energy management."

Elisa is pursuing network cloudification and extending this transformation from the network core towards the access network.

Cloudification plays a key role in the scalability of network services and allows the operator to meet customers’ changing needs.

According to Nokia, with Cloud RAN Elisa is able to shift the network computing power closer to the customers, whose network usage is transforming closer to the network edge.

AI-powered applications are likely to accelerate the demand for edge computing in the future, Nokia says.

Deploying the first commercial 5G cloud network in Europe puts Elisa in a strong position while moving towards the 6G era – which is predicted to be increasingly cloud-native, according to Nokia.

Additionally, says Nokia, cloudification plays a key role in Elisa’s journey towards self-driving and self-healing autonomous networks.

“This successful collaboration with Elisa confirms that our Cloud RAN solution is ready for commercial deployment, said Aji Ed, Head of Cloud RAN at Nokia.

"Under our anyRAN approach, we work very closely with strategic partners like Red Hat and bring together best-in-class partner solutions to offer true flexibility and scalability to operators and enterprises.

"For our customers, cloudification will enable new revenue models and monetisation options.”

Kalle Lehtinen, Chief Technology Officer, Elisa said the successful Cloud RAN deployment with Nokia is another important step in the telco's cloudification which started with cloudifying the network core and edge, and now includes the radio access network.

"We continue to pioneer new technologies in our journey towards autonomous operations helping us to continue innovating and delivering best customer experience,” Lehtinen said.

Honoré LaBourdette, vice president, Telco, Media, Entertainment & Edge Ecosystem, Red Hat, said Cloud RAN’s significance lies not only in providing an efficient and flexible way to deploy applications and derive value at the edge but also in boosting collaboration and innovation across the ecosystem.

"With Red Hat OpenShift, we’re making this vision a reality by offering a consistent hybrid cloud foundation that empowers businesses to build and scale the applications of the future," LaBourdette said.