·       Rakuten Symphony Global Innovation Lab will be core to R&D efforts leading industrialized automation of Open RAN-based, cloud native mobile networks.

·      The facilities will support the Indian government’s mission to develop home-grown telco solutions built in India for the world.

Bengaluru, India, July 21, 2022 – Rakuten Symphony, Inc., a global leader in cloud-native, Open RAN telco infrastructure platforms, services and solutions, today unveiled plans to establish a new lab in Bengaluru. The Rakuten Symphony Global Innovation Lab will be core to global research and development that is leading industrialized automation of Open RAN-based, cloud native mobile networks. The Global Innovation Lab is expected to open in early 2023 and will be housed inside new engineering development facilities opening simultaneously to bring together Rakuten Symphony’s Bengaluru employee base.

Tareq Amin, Chief Executive Officer of Rakuten Symphony, said, “Our operations around the world are powered by incredible Indian talent and creative innovation, so I am very proud to announce this additional investment with the establishment of our Global Innovation Lab and new engineering development facilities in Bengaluru. I am very confident that as we continue to grow here in India, our ability to provide telco solutions to the world will also grow exponentially.”

The Global Innovation Lab will be a state-of-the art facility that recreates the entire network architecture in a simulated environment, from RAN to Core to transport, enabling function and performance testing. The lab will also act as a showcase for Symworld™ platform, allowing Rakuten Symphony to demonstrate the capabilities and performance of the platform to customers. It will complement and expand upon Rakuten Symphony’s existing RAN lab in Bengaluru and the Rakuten Cloud Innovation Lab in Tokyo, allowing for global end-to-end testing of apps across the Symworld portfolio. Going forward, there are plans to set up facilities for 6G infrastructure R&D in the lab.

Narendra Narayana, Managing Director of Rakuten Symphony India said, “Rakuten Symphony India represents a key driver of innovation in the telecom space, and we are very excited to further expand our presence. We look forward to fostering local talent and working with local Indian and global partners to promote the adoption of Open RAN technologies and empower global telecom operators to build and operate secure mobile networks.”

Including locations in Bengaluru and Indore, Rakuten Symphony’s employee base in India has grown to over 3,300 in less than one year through acquisitions and organic growth, and there are plans to further expand headcount over the coming years through recruitment in the fields of Open RAN, cloud, automation, data and telecom standards. India is also an important source of new talent for Rakuten Symphony, with about 150 graduates from top engineering colleges set to come to Japan in 2022 to work for Rakuten Mobile and support the growth of Rakuten Symphony.

With operations across Japan, the United States, Singapore, India, Europe and the Middle East Africa region, Rakuten Symphony brings together all of Rakuten’s telco products, services and solutions under a single global banner to offer 4G and 5G infrastructure and platform solutions to customers worldwide.