Open RAN and vRAN growth slowed in 1Q 2023

According to a recently published report from Dell’Oro Group, the trusted source for market information about the telecommunications, security, networks, and data center industries, following a steep ascent in 2022, both Open RAN and Virtualized RAN (vRAN) revenue growth moderated in 1Q 2023.

“Since both Open RAN and vRAN are still driven by a few large service providers, the slower growth in the first quarter was for the most part in line with expectations, reflecting more so the state of the 5G rollouts with some of the advanced operators than a shift in the overall Open RAN/vRAN market sentiment,” said Stefan Pongratz, Vice President with the Dell’Oro Group. “There are also signs that activity is improving beyond the early adopters but it will of course take some time for the sum of these smaller early majority type deployments to move the broader market,” continued Pongratz.

Additional Open RAN and vRAN highlights from the 1Q 2023 RAN report:

• After more than doubling in 2022, Open RAN revenue growth was in the 10 to 20 percent range in the first quarter while the vRAN market advanced 20 to 30 percent.
• Positive developments in the Asia Pacific region were dragged down by more challenging comparisons in the North America region.
• Short-term projections remain unchanged – Open RAN is still projected to account for 6 to 10 percent of the 2023 RAN market.
• Top 5 Open RAN suppliers by revenue for the 2Q 2022 to 1Q 2023 period include Samsung, NEC, Fujitsu, Rakuten Symphony, and Mavenir.

DellOro