Elisa Finland adds 5G RAN to Ericsson 5G Core partnership

• Ericsson 5G RAN, including both standalone and non-standalone technologies, to be introduced from 2021; Ericsson 5G Core for standalone technology to be added to existing core network

• Ericsson 5G technology to help drive Elisa’s digitalization, IoT and Industry 4.0 ambitions in Finland

• Ericsson President and CEO, Börje Ekholm, says the deal reflects Ericsson’s growing 5G strength in Europe

Finnish telecommunications service provider, Elisa, has selected Ericsson for a comprehensive 5G technology deployment spanning 5G Core and 5G Radio Access Network (RAN).

The new agreement, with an option to extend, includes both 5G Non-standalone (5G NSA) and 5G Standalone (5G SA) products and solutions.

Ericsson Cloud Packet Core products and solutions, are already live in Elisa’s 5G network. As part of the partnership extension, Ericsson is now deploying its dual-mode 5G Core solution to add support for standalone technology in Elisa’s network.

The partnership will also see Ericsson 5G RAN products and solutions, from the Ericsson Radio System portfolio, introduced and deployed in Elisa’s 5G network from 2021. The network operates on 3.5GHz and 26GHz frequency bands.

Ericsson Spectrum Sharing for both 5G Standalone and 5G Non-Standalone will also be deployed as part of the deal. This will enable Elisa to dynamically share 4G and 5G traffic, while significantly enhancing capacity and coverage. Ericsson Spectrum Sharing will also allow Elisa to improve its mid- and high-band coverage through carrier aggregation with 5G in lower bands.

Veli-Matti Mattila, CEO, Elisa, says: “We’ve had a long and fruitful partnership with Ericsson and we are happy to continue our co-operation on a deeper level. This new wider partnership increases our capabilities not only in the network environment in Finland, but also in the international digital services area. With this partnership our telco automation domain - Elisa Automate and Polystar – also gets Ericsson’s radio network technology as a development platform, which enables new innovations to our automation service portfolio. I’m looking forward to further enhancing our customer experience, together with Ericsson, for our Finnish and our global customers.“

Börje Ekholm, President and CEO, Ericsson, says: “We are delighted to strengthen our partnership with 5G pioneer Elisa. Our 5G Core and RAN technology leadership will further enhance Elisa’s ambitions to deliver the benefits of digitalization, the Internet of Things and Industry 4.0 to its customers. This partnership with Elisa also underlines our growing strength in Europe in 5G Core and RAN. We remain determined to be the trusted partner of choice for operators across Europe as they commit to 5G.”

Ericsson and Elisa have a history of innovating together, including close cooperation on 5G. The companies teamed up recently to achieve the Nordics’ first end-to-end 5G standalone connection in Kirkkonummi, Finland. In 2019, the two partners also piloted Ericsson’s private network solution for Elisa’s enterprise customers.

Ericsson currently has 109 commercial 5G agreements and contracts with unique communications service providers, of which 60 are publicly announced 5G deals, including 62 live commercial 5G networks.

Source: Ericsson media announcement