Digital Catapult has announced a new phase for its SONIC Labs initiative, which focuses on developing Open RAN technology. The program is bringing several international companies into its cohort to use a newly established outdoor testing facility in West London. These participants will trial Open RAN equipment and software in realistic outdoor conditions to evaluate practical applications and benefits.
Open RAN aims to transform the telecoms sector by enabling interoperable components from different vendors, increasing competition and accelerating innovation. By disaggregating hardware and software elements, Open RAN can offer mobile network operators more flexible, cost-effective deployment and operational models.
Supported by Ofcom and funded by the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology (DSIT), the SONIC Labs program provides a vendor-neutral, collaborative environment to test and improve the market readiness of Open RAN solutions. Its facilities support both indoor lab work and outdoor field trials, helping vendors validate performance under real operational conditions.
Lindsey Fussell, Group Director for Networks and Communications at Ofcom, said the move to outdoor testing signals an important step for the initiative. She emphasized that testing in a real-world outdoor environment exposes products to challenges they will face in live networks, including weather, variable signal conditions, and spectrum management constraints.
The outdoor testing phase is designed to address deployment complexities operators encounter in everyday operations, such as adverse weather, multipath and interference, changing user densities, and regulatory considerations tied to licensed spectrum. These trials will assess how Open RAN systems perform when subjected to those factors and will inform improvements that increase reliability and commercial viability.
Dritan Khaleshi, Co-Director of SONIC Labs, noted that success will depend on giving the new cohort access to both the outdoor and indoor facilities, along with technical support and collaborative opportunities with industry peers. The program’s structure encourages multi-vendor integration work and shared testing to accelerate interoperability and readiness for deployment.
The companies using the outdoor test site in this phase include Accelleran, G REIGNS, LIONS, VVDN, and Pegatron. ALPHA Networks will concentrate on indoor testing at Digital Catapult’s London headquarters. Participating firms will measure key performance indicators critical to Open RAN adoption—such as throughput, latency, handover reliability, and radio unit performance—to strengthen Open RAN’s case for commercial roll-out and to support the UK’s leadership in this technology area.
Anju Day, CEO of LIONS, explained that this stage of SONIC Labs moves beyond lab-based compliance and interoperability testing to focus on real-world field deployment, licensed spectrum use, and practical applications. She highlighted that LIONS will contribute an 8T8R outdoor radio unit designed for high-density user scenarios and looks forward to collaborating with vendors of central units and RIC (RAN Intelligent Controller) solutions.
As SONIC Labs expands outdoor trials, the program will generate data and operational insights that help shape future telecom infrastructure decisions. The results will inform vendors, operators, and policymakers on how Open RAN performs in live environments and what improvements are needed to accelerate widespread adoption.
See also: EU antitrust chief warns against telecoms mergers
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