I’m wanting ahead to becoming a member of our prospects and companions at Cell World Congress (MWC), February 26 to February 29, 2024, in Barcelona. Developments in generative AI proceed to speed up the tempo of business transformation, with telecommunications rising as a pacesetter in AI adoption.

Learn the weblog Accelerating Telco Transformation within the Period of AI by Jason Zander, Government Vice President, Strategic Missions and Expertise, to find out how operators are utilizing Microsoft’s AI and Copilot options to raise buyer experiences, streamline enterprise operations, monetize 5G investments, and modernize their community.

On this weblog, I’ll share a lot of thrilling updates about our Azure for Operators portfolio of cloud-based options that allow operators to drive innovation and effectivity within the community. We’re proud to announce an increasing buyer base and the infusion of AI throughout Azure for Operators merchandise.

Modernize networks with a hybrid carrier-grade platform and AI-powered automation and insights

Deep integration of the community with the Azure cloud is basis to utilizing AI-powered automation and insights to unlock improved effectivity, scalability, safety, and reliability. For the reason that basic availability announcement of Azure Operator Nexus—our provider grade, hybrid platform, our progress contains:

• Extra Operator Nexus deployments supporting 5G standalone roll outs as main platform.
• Increasing capabilities to deal with nationwide safety necessities in a number of areas.
• Growing assist for frequent operational necessities and refining strategy to the DevSecOps fashions supporting multi-vendor community operate deployments.
• Extra kind elements to assist RAN and extra workloads.
• As a service mannequin to assist buyer and accomplice lab deployments in Microsoft datacenters.
• Expanded Nexus Prepared program with over 20 licensed companions and over 80 community features.

Operator Nexus allows operators to run workloads on-premises or on Azure, seamlessly deploying and managing all the things from the naked metallic to the community to the tenant. Objective-built for and validated by tier 1 operators to run mission-critical workloads, Operator Nexus:

• Accelerates time to marketplace for new companies.
• Lowers whole price of possession (TCO).
• Drives operational effectivity and resiliency.
• Critically, improves the safety of extremely distributed, software-based networks.

“As a part of e& UAE’s transformation to turning into a digital telco we’re excited to collaborate carefully with Microsoft as we drive innovation in our companies and excellence in our buyer expertise. The usage of Azure Operator Nexus and Azure Operator 5G Core to assist our core community will higher allow us to leverage the ability of AI and automation and supply new avenues for monetization.”

—Khalid Murshed, Chief Expertise and Info Officer, e& UAE.

Azure for Operators

Learn the way telecom operators are reworking with Azure.

“AT&T is transferring to the following section of our cloud migration that features deploying Microsoft’s Azure Operator Nexus platform in our community as a part of the following section of our 5G SA deployment. Persevering with its management in cloud networking, AT&T is utilizing cloud native DevOps instruments to drive enhancements similar to one-touch deployment, vendor-agnostic framework, CI/CD integration, automated community testing, in-service upgrades, and superior safety and compliance administration. Azure Operator Nexus’ API-driven answer helped us to considerably simplify, automate, and enhance the deployment cycle time for cloud infrastructure software program and configuration in our information facilities.”

—Yigal Elbaz, Senior Vice President, Community CTO.

Learn our tech group weblog to study extra about Azure Operator Nexus.

AI-enabled insights for operators

Azure Operator Insights and Copilot in Azure Operator Insights empower operators to drive effectivity, pace, and accuracy in community operations. Copilot in Azure Operator Insights, now in restricted preview, represents a game-changer for community engineers. Copilot in Azure Operator Insights will empower community engineers to spend extra time fixing and fewer time diagnosing buyer issues by effectively figuring out, mitigating, and resolving community points. This service brings operator-focused gen AI-infused product allows operators to maneuver from reactive, to proactive, and predictive community administration. Community well being may be constantly monitored throughout a number of underlying administration programs, permitting for anomalous well being metrics to be detected and the interplay of complicated companies to be extra simply visualized. Community well being alerts proactively inform the LLM-based prompts, accelerating the flexibility to mitigate utilizing ideas analyzed from information sources similar to product manuals, assist web sites, person boards, and troubleshooting guides. Collected experiences are used to additional tune the AI mannequin utilizing data maintained within the operator’s subscription.

At this time, Azure Operator Insights and Copilot in Azure Operator Insights are delivering AI-infused insights to drive community effectivity for purchasers like 3UK and taking part companions together with Amdocs, Accenture, and ServiceNow.

Azure Operator Insights removes information silos and delivers actionable enterprise insights by enabling the gathering and evaluation of huge portions of community information gathered from complicated multi-vendor community features. Leveraging ingest and question expertise designed to assist Azure itself, Azure Operator Insights can analyze information streams sized at a number of petabytes per day in timeframes that can’t be achieved with standard toolsets. Operator Insights helps operators sort out complicated situations similar to community well being, efficiency, safety, end-to-end buyer expertise, and operations effectivity.

Azure Operator Insights makes use of a contemporary information mesh structure enabling complicated domains to be damaged into manageable sub-domains referred to as information merchandise that combine huge datasets from completely different sources and distributors. This new functionality, information product manufacturing facility, allows operators, community gear suppliers, and answer integrators to develop distinctive information merchandise that may be printed to Azure Market or for particular person buyer use. We’re excited to be working with Accenture and Amdocs as our preliminary collaborators with the Azure Operator Insights information product manufacturing facility.

“3UK is utilizing Azure Operator Insights to leverage the most recent AI developments via the Copilot in Azure Operator Insights product. That is an thrilling growth that brings collectively the most recent in generative AI and helps our dedication to higher connectivity, on daily basis, for each buyer.”

—Iain Milligan, Chief Community Officer, 3UK.

Go to our tech group weblog for extra use circumstances.

Trendy cellular packet core

Azure Operator 5G Core, now in public preview, is designed to fulfill the evolving wants of cellular community operators, providing a totally containerized carrier-grade, any-G, hybrid cellular packet core with absolutely built-in community features that run on-premises or in-cloud. It’s a trendy structure confirmed within the subject at scale primarily based on acquired packet core expertise from our Affirmed Networks acquisition.

Key options since personal preview embrace:

• Inline person aircraft companies present operators with environment friendly community useful resource utilization in a diminished footprint whereas enhancing total person expertise.
• APIs for repeatable and constant automation for speedy, error-free service rollouts.
• Micro service structure helps 2G to 5G in single deployment.
• Containerization drives excessive efficiency and effectivity.
• Built-in with cloud-based companies for zero belief safety, AI primarily based automation, and superior analytics.
• Speedy time to market with DevSecOps-based strategy.

For extra details about these enhancements for Azure Operator 5G Core, go to our tech group weblog.

Safety and compliance for telecom workloads

We’re dedicated to supporting our prospects’ safety and compliance obligations. In deepening our dedication, we now have joined the GSMA Community Tools Safety Assurance Scheme (NESAS) to assist make sure the safety and compliance of our merchandise. Particular to the UK (UK), we assist the UK Telecoms Safety Assurance (TSA) code of follow.

“We’re delighted to welcome Microsoft Azure for Operators to the Community Tools Safety Assurance Scheme (NESAS). By becoming a member of NESAS, Microsoft demonstrates its management to offering safe and reliable options for the telecom business. NESAS supplies a typical safety framework that enhances transparency and confidence within the community gear provide chain. We look ahead to working with Microsoft and different members of the scheme to advance the safety and reliability of telecom networks world wide.”

—Samantha Kight, Head of Trade Safety, GSMA.

Monetize 5G investments and improve buyer experiences with trendy related purposes

For operators, the flexibility to monetize a differentiated community expertise requires exposing key capabilities to builders and ISVs, whose efforts speed up the event of contemporary related purposes, rushing adoption, and worth creation. The bulletins on this part make it attainable for operators to monetize AI, programmable community, and edge compute.

Asserting Azure Operator Name Safety in public preview

We’re asserting a brand new service that makes use of AI to guard shoppers from phone rip-off calls. Azure Operator Name Safety makes use of real-time evaluation of voice content material, alerting shoppers when there may be suspicious in-call exercise. Operator Name Safety works on any endpoint (cellular or landline) and is solely network-derived (no app obtain required) making for easy monetization of the service as both a premium characteristic or a part of a service bundle. It’s constructed on Azure Communications Gateway, which allows connectivity between an operator voice community and Microsoft Groups and different cloud communication companies. Operators taking part in preview embrace British Telecom Group and Far EasTone.

“We’ve already carried out varied measures to guard our buyer base from many hundreds of thousands of rip-off calls and texts, however with fraud a rising downside within the UK, we’re at all times how we will take client safety to the following stage. That’s why we’re collaborating with Microsoft to pilot Azure Operator Name Safety and analyze how, by utilizing superior (AI) capabilities, we will additional improve our defenses in opposition to fraudulent exercise.”

—Reza Rahnama, MBE, MD Cell Networks, BT Group.

Go to our tech group weblog for extra details about Azure Operator Name Safety.

Azure Programmable Connectivity (APC) is now obtainable in public preview as an Azure service. Now absolutely built-in into the Azure Market, APC empowers operators to commercialize their community APIs and simplifies their entry for builders. APC supplies seamless entry to Open Gateway for builders to create cloud and edge-native purposes that work together with the intelligence of the community. By offering a unified, customary interface throughout operator networks, builders can create cloud and edge-native purposes that work together with the intelligence of networks.

We’re actively collaborating with international operators integrating their community APIs to develop a robust accomplice ecosystem (similar to AT&T, BT, Claro, Deutsche Telekom, MEO, Orange, Rogers, Singtel, Telefonica, T-Cell, TIM Brasil, Verizon, and Vivo). We additionally proceed working with community expertise companions and community programmability aggregators, similar to Ericsson and Vonage, in addition to Nokia and Nokia’s Community as Code platform, making concrete progress accelerating the ecosystem on community programmability.

“Verizon’s community APIs allow builders to create new experiences, ease ache factors in buyer interactions, and enhance buyer safety by enabling entry to Verizon community APIs via Azure’s APC, builders throughout the globe can profit from Verizon’s deep data of the info atmosphere and expansive community useful resource.”

—Srini Kalapala, Senior Vice President of Expertise and Product Improvement, Verizon.

Learn the way APC is revolutionizing the way in which builders work together with community API companies and find out how enterprises are benefiting from network-aware purposes.

Azure personal MEC allows operators to assist trendy related purposes with high-performance, ultra-low-latency edge options. Listed here are a number of examples of how enterprises are reworking operations with 5G:

• Noble Company, one of many largest offshore drilling contractors on the earth, is deploying Azure personal MEC to offer mobility options for the crew whereas rising effectivity. “With Tampnet’s Personal Offshore Community and Azure personal MEC, onsite connectivity is now not a problem for Noble. Related staff, and protected and safe networks are accelerating implementation of digital initiatives for improved offshore operations.”—Juan Vesga, OTG Undertaking Supervisor, Noble Company.
• Trinity Broadcast Networks (TBN), has put in a non-public 5G community deployment from our accomplice, Trilogy NextGen Networks, within the Dallas-Fort Value metroplex. “As the brand new house for a lot of of TBN’s hottest information and leisure packages, in addition to ‘Dr. Phil Primetime,’ it was important to create a facility that delivers the last word state-of-the-art expertise. Our partnership with Trilogy NextGen helps us invigorate the world of broadcasting, as we push the boundaries of content material creation to encourage, inform, and uplift audiences world wide.”—Russell Corridor, Senior Vice President of Manufacturing, TBN.
• 5G PORTAL–the Offshore Renewable Vitality (ORE) Catapult, along with Microsoft and a wider consortium of companions, have created an offshore 5G geared up testbed, masking the Port of Grimsby and the  operational Lynn and Internal Dowsing Wind Farm. 

Increasing accomplice ecosystem for contemporary related purposes

Our companions are actively growing trendy related purposes that run on Azure personal MEC. We’ve got onboarded greater than 20 ISVs and dozens of SI and operator companions. Study extra under about a few of the new accomplice options obtainable on Azure Market.

• Glartek’s Augmented & Related Employee platform makes use of AR to assist enterprise operations.
• Scenera’s MAIstro software program as a service (SaaS) presents a complete answer for orchestrating AI analytics seamlessly from edge to cloud.
• Tampnet’s offshore personal networks present safe connectivity for offshore operators and vessels.
• Taqtile Manifest® Combined Actuality Work Instruction Answer leverages blended actuality to enhance operational workflows.
• T-Cell’s 5G Superior Community Options supplies “right-sized” options for enterprises.
• Zebra Applied sciences Company’s Workcloud Communication platform allows safe and dependable communication for front-line staff.

See how ISV companions are powering AI-enabled purposes.

Get began right this moment

Microsoft and our ecosystem companions are constructing a really “higher collectively” structure that holistically addresses the wants of community operators as they rework their networks. Wanting forward, we stay dedicated to being essentially the most trusted co-innovation accomplice via each stage of the digital evolution, working with operators and enterprises to future-proof networks and unlock new income streams in a cloud- and AI-native future.

Invitation to operators, system integrators, and community managers

Invitation to enterprises, builders, and ISVs

• Whether or not you’re an enterprise trying to leverage our options, a developer desperate to create network-aware purposes, or an utility ISV looking for to collaborate with Microsoft on MEC options, we invite you to take the following step. Enroll now to hitch us in constructing the way forward for telecommunications with Azure for Operators. 
• To find out how Microsoft helps organizations embrace 5G with trendy related purposes, join information and updates delivered to your inbox.