Francois Giudice, Correspondent France

Orange and Nokia have announced the deployment of a 4G/5G private network combined with network slicing at Schneider Electric’s plant in Le Vaudreuil, France. Network slicing is a key feature for the management of end-to-end 4G/5G quality-of-service and security of industrial processes, operations and applications in Industry 4.0.

Nokia has been selected by Orange to build a sliced 4G/5G private network for a modern industrial environment, providing reliable, scalable and sustainable connectivity solutions for industrial use cases.

Nokia’s slicing solution supports existing LTE, 5G Standalone (5G SA) and 5G Non Standalone (5G NSA) devices and also includes domain controller software in RAN, core and transport layers to enable full slice connectivity. The slice continuity between LTE and 5G NR allows Orange and Schneider Electric to operate a state-of-the-art indoor network in an industrial setting. With this solution, both partners continue to implement and test the management of the different priorities, performance, and security capabilities adapted to their innovative use cases, while optimizing network resources.

As a global network-native digital services company with dual expertise of both an operator and end-to-end integrator, Orange Business Services offers its industrial customers a complete portfolio: Mobile Private Networks (MPN) built on private infrastructures, virtual MPNs on the public network and hybrid MPNs combining private and public infrastructures. The choice of architecture is made to best meet the security, performance and resiliency requirements of the business customers’ use cases both on and off the industrial campuses, as well as to optimize costs.

Senior Vice President Radio Networks at Orange Innovation and 5G Champion, Arnaud Vamparys said: “Thanks to Nokia’s advanced slicing technology, Orange is able to further explore with Schneider Electric the power of scalable private 4G/5G connectivity applied to industrial uses.”

President of Mobile Networks at Nokia, Tommi Uitto said: “With Nokia’s network slicing solution, Communication Service Providers and Enterprises can enjoy first to market advantage through the early launch of new slicing services, for all end-users equipped with 4G or 5G devices. As a long time innovation partner, Nokia is delighted to achieve this first with Orange in an industrial manufacturing environment.”