Telstra and Ericsson collaborate to shape the future of autonomous networks

Telstra and Ericsson (NASDAQ: ERIC) have announced a targeted, ambitious collaboration agreement that will provide the framework for the two companies’ joint work to accelerate the shift toward autonomous networks.

The agreement comes as the telecom industry faces an urgent need to accelerate autonomy, yet the path to fully autonomous networks remains complex. Achieving this vision means overcoming technological and operational barriers and aligning on standards. It demands collaboration, innovation, and openness across the industry.

The collaboration will explore key component challenges to the adoption of autonomous networks such as fragmented and siloed data, gaps between business intent and execution, the complexity created by multi-vendor and multi-domain environments and the trustworthiness of AI models. These challenges will be addressed through key strategic areas of collaboration:

• Advancing intent translation frameworks to bridge business goals and network actions.
• Building a knowledge plane (an information layer using data, AI, and reasoning to monitor, analyze, and control the network intelligently) that can act effectively as the foundation of autonomous networks
• Integrating trustworthy AI to build trust and confidence by making AI decision-making transparent and understandable
• Catalyzing industry transformation by validating outcomes and setting industry standard for collaboration and open sharing of results and insights

Telstra and Ericsson’s collaboration will center on two interconnected elements: a Technology Lab to experiment and design, and Proof Points to demonstrate and validate proposed solutions.  Collaboration with other industry parties will be integral to ensure interoperability and drive broad adoption of the solutions.

Mark Sanders, Telstra’s Chief Architect, says: “This collaboration between Telstra and Ericsson provides the momentum and focus the global telecom industry needs to advance towards intent-driven autonomy. Developing and validating ideas and technical possibilities in real environments is essential to closing the gap between aspiration and execution. Addressing the foundations will be critical to shaping the industry and influencing standards.”

Mats Karlsson, Head of Solution Area Business & Operations Support Systems, Ericsson says: “Our collaboration with Telstra will be pivotal in defining and shaping industry-leading pathways, elements and use-cases for autonomous networks, setting a strong precedent for openness and collaboration. The telecommunications industry has faced challenges of scalability, monetization and service creation and only through joint efforts in fundamental research and the development of automation and trustworthy AI, like this one with Telstra, will we be able to successfully overcome these challenges.”