Key Takeaways:
- AT&T is leading the charge toward an open, intelligent, and scalable network future.
- Recent tests show measurable gains, indicating AI-driven RAN features can boost efficiency and user experience.
AT&T and Ericsson have reached a significant milestone in AI-powered telecoms by successfully demonstrating Ericsson’s AI-native Link Adaptation on a Cloud RAN stack powered by Intel Xeon 6 SoC. The test, focused on AT&T’s frequency bands and propagation characteristics, marked the first call with portable Ericsson software and underscored AI’s potential to enhance RAN speed, flexibility, and performance. The demo featured Xeon 6 SoC in AT&T’s target Cloud RAN setup, highlighting the progression from initial call to feature capability and how Ericsson’s AI solution can boost network efficiency and user experience.
AI-native Link Adaptation uses real-time AI models to respond to changing channel conditions and varying interference when determining how much data to transmit at a given instant – improving throughput and spectral efficiency.
The tests indicated significant throughput gains, achieving up to a 20 percent increase compared to legacy rule-based link adaptation, along with corresponding improvements in spectral efficiency and they serve as a collaborative benchmark for AI in RAN. Ericsson and Intel are jointly benchmarking AI models on commercial off-the-shelf hardware, delivering measurable improvements in AI inference, speed, and a scalable path for AT&T to deploy AI where it drives the most value.
Why this milestone matters
- Open architecture allows AT&T to integrate innovations more quickly and flexibly run Ericsson software across multiple platforms, avoiding lock-in. This flexibility and portability enable faster scaling of new capabilities from the lab to the live network.
- First-mover advantage. AT&T is the first in the industry to demonstrate the portability of a commercial-ready AI feature on a Xeon 6 SoC- based cloud platform.
Using AT&T’s target Cloud RAN configuration, this end-to-end proof of concept shows that Ericsson’s hardware-agnostic RAN stack can be deployed on the Xeon 6 SoC for AT&T’s deployment.
Rob Soni, Vice President, RAN Technology at AT&T, says: “AT&T is leading the charge toward an open, intelligent, and scalable network future by advancing Open RAN and Cloud RAN with AI-native capabilities at their core. This demo highlights how AI capabilities, powered by our next-generation Cloud RAN platform, can be deployed seamlessly to drive innovation and deliver superior customer experiences.”
Mårten Lerner, Head of Networks Strategy and Product Management, Business Area Networks at Ericsson, says: “Together with AT&T and Intel, Ericsson is demonstrating how our domain expertise combined with AI-native RAN software can drive transformative advancements in both Cloud RAN and purpose-built deployments. Our industry-leading AI-native Link Adaptation serves as the first proof point on this journey. With a hardware-agnostic RAN software stack, Ericsson is committed to offering maximum flexibility and enabling all our customers to benefit from future innovations – regardless of their chosen underlying hardware. This milestone underscores Ericsson’s commitment to helping operators advance their networks by deploying AI functionality across the RAN stack.”
Cristina Rodriguez, VP and GM, Network and Edge at Intel, says: “This successful collaboration with AT&T and Ericsson showcases the power of Intel Xeon 6 SoC to enable and accelerate AI workloads in Cloud RAN environments. Xeon 6 SoC is architected to handle the demanding compute requirements of AI-native network functions, delivering the performance and efficiency operators need to unlock the full potential of intelligent networks. By providing a flexible, standards-based platform, Intel Xeon 6 enables service providers like AT&T to deploy innovative AI capabilities while maintaining the openness and choice that drive industry innovation.”
About the AI-powered technology
AI-native Link Adaptation dynamically adjusts to changes in signal quality and interference, boosting RAN performance on purpose-built and cloud-based infrastructure alike.
Ericsson Cloud RAN is a cloud native software solution that handles compute functionality in the RAN. It virtualizes RAN functions on Commercial Off The Shelf (COTS) hardware, decoupling software from hardware to enable more flexible, scalable, and efficient network deployments.
Engineered specifically for network and edge deployments, Intel Xeon 6 SoC delivers breakthrough AI RAN performance with built-in acceleration. Integrated Intel Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX) and Intel Advanced Matrix Extension (AMX) technologies eliminate the need for discrete accelerators while maximizing capacity, efficiency, and TCO optimization.
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