Broadband Forum welcomes VMware and EANTC as technology partners to launch European Open Broadband Lab

Broadband Forum today announced VMware and the European Advanced Networking Test Center (EANTC) as technology partners in the launch of the European Open Broadband Lab as a joint effort to accelerate network transformation and migration to a cloud-based broadband infrastructure. Beginning in mid-2019, the lab will host test campaigns for vendor and Communications Service Provider (CSP) members of the Broadband Forum. All parties will be able to validate multi-vendor interoperability of their virtualized solutions and broadband access infrastructure aligning with Broadband Forum standards on full Network Function Virtualization (NFV) infrastructures. Operators have also given their support to the lab, with Bruno Cornaglia, Fixed Access Senior Manager at Vodafone Group, saying: "We welcome the establishment of this new laboratory which is a significant step towards establishing interoperability for virtualization techniques such as SDN and NFV, addressing use cases such as Fixed Access Network Sharing (FANS). Within the partnership, Broadband Forum maintains the Open Broadband Infrastructure (OB-I) architecture and publishes a multitude of use cases for innovation to be tested against. VMware has provided and installed the virtualization platform, while EANTC organizes and hosts test campaigns, and will provide ongoing expertise.