Nokia struck a licensing agreement with HPE-owned Juniper Networks to integrate the company’s RAN Intelligent Controller (RIC) platform and associated development teams within its business, boosting the vendor’s AI-powered RAN automation capabilities.

The vendor stated that under a global agreement, it will combine Juniper Networks’ RIC with its MantaRay AI-powered Service Management and Orchestration (SMO) and network automation assets.

RIC and SMO development teams from HPE moved to Nokia Mobile Networks division on 1 October as part of the deal.

In a post on LinkedIn before Nokia’s announcement, Constantine Polychronopoulos, group VP of 5G and Telco Cloud at Juniper Networks, said it would team with Nokia Mobile Networks’ network management team, while hailing five years of work to develop its RIC platform and SMO system for on-demand and end-to-end network slicing.

Tommi Uitto, president of Mobile Networks at Nokia, stated customers worldwide would benefit from the enhanced capabilities of its “AI-driven automation, orchestration and open ecosystems, enabling them to manage multi-vendor networks more efficiently and prepare for the transition from 5G to 6G”.

Operators including Rakuten Symphony, Deutsche Telekom and Vodafone Group previously announced trials of Juniper Networks’ RIC platform.

MantaRay SMO is Nokia’s advanced-AI driven, zero touch automation product which it states is fully open-RAN compliant.