Dutch signaling experts BroadForward land their sixth GLOMO nomination for product innovation and achievement
Amersfoort, The Netherlands, May 24, 2021
The GSMA announced today that the BroadForward converged signaling solution, enabling 4G-5G Hybrid Core, is nominated for the Global Mobile Awards (GLOMO) in the category Best Mobile & Network Software Breakthrough. This is the 6th time BroadForward has been shortlisted by the GSMA. Over its 26 years existence, the GLOMOs have been established as the telecom industry’s most influential awards.
The winner in this category will be announced on Wednesday June 30th, in a virtual award ceremony during the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, the world’s largest annual exhibition for the mobile industry.
The nomination is for BroadForward’s converged signaling solution, a single engine software platform designed to run core network functionality and provide support for all key signaling technologies such as SS7 (2G/3G), Diameter (4G), HTTP/2 (5G) and various other protocols. Operators use the BroadForward solution to deploy any combination of its on-board routing, interworking, security or storage functions, for integration and co-existence of 2G, 3G, 4G, 5G, Fixed and Wi-Fi systems, and beyond. The platform is in use at over 70 service providers (MNOs, MVNEs, MVNOs, IPX, IoT) around the world, running combinations of core signaling functions for all mobile access technologies including 5G.
With the current 5G non-standalone (NSA) and 5G standalone (SA) options, separate silos are created for the 4G and 5G Core. BroadForward however enables building a “4G-5G Hybrid Core” which facilitates a gradual transition from 4G to 5G Core, rather than having to take this big step all at once. BroadForward’s converged signaling solution supports operators to have multiple generations of core network functions co-existing and working together. Existing 4G network components (and even legacy 2G/3G systems) can be retained and combined with new 5G core network functions. This offers an economically much more favorable solution.
BroadForward CEO Taco Schoute commented: “This GSMA nomination is a tribute to our long held vision that signaling solutions should work across traditional technology divides. Whereas the life cycle of products designed for specific technologies and use cases are by nature limited, our converged signaling solution is unique, open-ended and continuous. It enables operators to combine and integrate multiple generations of core network functions. This way they can simultaneously invest in future proof technology while retaining and incorporating legacy network functions as part of network transition strategy”.