DISH Wireless is adding to its already eye-popping list of vendors by adding Dell Technologies to its growing roster. A known force in the world of computing, the tech giant hailing from Round Rock, Texas, will be helping DISH Wireless improve its 5G network by assisting with DISH’s edge cloud. “Dell is providing the hardware-software foundation for (DISH’s) edge cloud,” said the SVP and GM of Dell Technologies Telecom Systems Business, Dennis Hoffman. He would go on to also state that Dell would “act as an aggregation point for the silicon ecosystem to drive these platforms.”
Edge computing will play a large part in what DISH Wireless is doing with its 5G network. The wireless industry as a whole took notice when DISH announced it was launching a cloud-native 5G network with help of Amazon Web Services (AWS). Now, DISH Wireless is building a “huge distributed edge cloud” as Marc Rouanne, the Chief Network Officer of DISH Wireless mentioned the need to work with a vendor to develop this ambition.
The goal of America’s newest major wireless provider is to create and distribute three tiers of edge. AWS is working on the largest tier where DISH Wireless is “pushing the data centers to the availability zones and local zones so we can push large (computing) close to the markets.” The second, middle tier will be made of cellular towers and the public cloud with thousands of locations connected by fiber that house “mini data centers” according to Rouanne. Finally, the third tier will be for cell tower locations and enterprises. “We’ll repeat the same architecture at the micro-level. We have a Kubernetes layer working with VMware to orchestrate all that,” said Rouanne.
If there is one thing DISH Wireless refuses to shy away from in its deployment of 5G, it’s innovation. We see more evidence as the parent company of Boost Mobile is looking to put servers at the base of its cell towers. This technique is not widely adopted with very few companies using it, most notably American Tower, a vendor of DISH Wireless.
At first, DISH Wireless is looking to deploy these servers from Dell at leased towers to help power its 5G radios. Because of the vast differences in locations and specific challenges these terrains can bring, Dell is working on creating a package that works for this unique project with Hoffman listing a “micro data center at a cell tower in Montana in the middle of winter” as an example.
This news is breaking right after the mysterious Project Gene5is website popped up in mid-June 2021. Though sparse on details, the purpose of the website seems to be to notify consumers when DISH Wireless would have its 5G network up and running in their area. These actions are suggesting that DISH Wireless continues to push along and make considerable progress on deploying its nationwide 5G network. The first city, Las Vegas, Nevada, is expecting to connect later in 2021 as the first market for deployment.
Source: Fierce Wireless
