Marvell set to play a key role in 5G virtual and Open RAN (Analyst Angle)

Marvell is a recognized leader in the data center chipsets market. However, when it comes to cellular space, despite being a valuable silicon provider to major network vendors, Marvell has largely remained away from the limelight. But that is set to change with the industry pivoting toward virtual, open, and cloud-native RAN architectures. The company, capitalizing on its technology expertise, end-to-end portfolio, and strong partnerships, is set to play a key role in 5G, as networks with these new architectures are starting to get rolled out.

Silent partner to leading cellular infra players

For the last few years, much before the virtual and Open RAN frenzy, Marvell has been providing data, baseband, and network processors for radio base stations. The majority of tier-1 global cellular infra vendors, including Nokia, Samsung, Fujitsu, and others, except Huawei are Marvell’s customers.

Marvell not only supplies off-the-shelf merchant silicon solutions but also offers the flexibility to customize some portions of those solutions (aka custom ASICs) to better suit customer’s needs. Its standard offerings include Octeon Fusion, Octeon TX2, and newly introduced Octeon 10 Data Processing Units (DPUs) as well as a slew of networking products…