Amdocs, Microsoft, VMware, Other Technology Leaders Join 5G Open Innovation Lab as Founding Partners to Help Start-Ups, Entrepreneurs Develop Groundbreaking 5G Services, Applications

The 5G Open Innovation Lab, a global ecosystem of developers, enterprises and government institutions, announced that Amdocs, Dell Technologies, Microsoft , and VMware have joined the Lab as founding partners providing engineering and technology resources to the Lab’s diverse start-up ecosystem.  Founding partners Intel, NASA and T-Mobile, who launched the Lab in May, welcomed the new members who will broaden the Lab participants’ access to leading-edge network, software and hardware platforms, in addition to creating direct customer relationships that accelerate market adoption.

“We’re working harder than ever to build a transformative 5G network for all, but we must build something even bigger – an ecosystem that creates economic value beyond traditional telecom,” said Neville Ray, President of Technology at T-Mobile. “These new founding partners will help us do just that, broadening the pipeline of development for 5G solutions across all industries.”

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The Lab selects 15 to 20 early- and later-stage companies to participate in the program twice a year. These companies represent 5G infrastructure and 5G-enabled technologies such as artificial intelligence, edge computing and IoT across diverse markets including agritech, manufacturing, entertainment, transportation and energy. Founding members have visibility into these new solutions, and can choose which companies they want to work with to help accelerate their solutions and develop real-world proof-of-concepts. Founding partners provide engineering, technology, mentorship and industry resources to entrepreneurs and their companies to help them develop, test and bring to market new use cases.

According to Gartner, the global 5G services market is projected to reach $41.48 billion by 2020 expanding at a rate of 43.9% CAGR from 2021 to 2027. “The Lab is an opportunity for us to learn what is possible,” said Jim Brisimitzis, general partner of the 5G Open Innovation Lab. “Our partners are critical to helping us identify these opportunities and remove the market friction that normally can deter progress and slow innovation. As business and technology leaders, our partners quite simply are market makers and the Lab is a proving ground for collaboration and invention.”

Amdocs, a leading provider of software and services to the world’s leading communications and media companies, joins the Lab with a focus on helping service providers accelerate the wave of 5G advancements around cloud, edge computing, IoT and new customer experiences.  Said Anthony Goonetilleke, group president of Media, Network and Technology, Amdocs, “We believe that 5G will power the next generation of customer experiences, ranging from innovative consumer applications to complex enterprise partnerships built on a long-tail partner ecosystem.  We are excited to be part of this new venture in accelerating creative collaboration between 5G leaders, working together to bring seamless experiences to life while exploring diverse industry applications of 5G, including autonomous vehicles, remote surgery and immersive mobile VR and AR, among others.”

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As an essential technology company in the data era, Dell Technologies focuses on enabling our customers build solutions that drive human progress. In support of that vision, Dell Technologies is enabling Telecom organizations to extend their capabilities, moving beyond today’s connectivity to offer new enterprise services that will ignite broad industry innovations and create new revenue streams. Dell Technologies is committed to creating an open and modern platform that leverages the latest 5G technologies to help companies reduce costs, improve agility and the overall end-customer experience.

“Dell Technologies sees 5G as a key driver for digital transformation and can facilitate the mobile connection between people, things, systems and businesses resulting in a new and exciting era,” said David Trigg, Vice President of Ecosystems for Dell Technologies Telecom Systems Business. “We firmly believe that the telecom industry must come together as an ecosystem to provide more choice in how global communications networks are deployed and run while driving out complexity and cost.  As a founding member, we see the 5G Open Innovation Lab as a critical component in driving toward these goals, benefiting the telecom industry and the customers that it serves globally.”

As cloud and communications networks converge, Microsoft is providing businesses globally with the hyperscale cloud infrastructure to move toward a future that unlocks the full potential of 5G: simplifying and enriching people’s personal and professional lives. Microsoft will serve as the founding public cloud partner of the 5G Open Innovation Lab and will play a key role in supporting the Lab’s work to accelerate enterprise startups and launch new innovations. The Lab will create long-term, sustainable developer and commercial ecosystems that will accelerate the delivery of exciting new capabilities at the edge, including pervasive IoT intelligence and immersive mixed reality.

“We believe optimized, cloud-native software plays an important role in advancing 5G and creating new capabilities, new markets and new opportunities for businesses and societies,” said Leen Kashyap, Director, 5G Strategy and Ecosystems for Microsoft. “It’s collaborative efforts like this one, where founders, members and participants are working together with unique strengths, that will further advance this important technology.”

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VMware is helping communication service providers meet the increasing demand for innovative 5G services by delivering a Telco Cloud platform that can efficiently create, monetize, and deliver an array of new applications and services for both consumer and enterprise segments. Said Shekar Ayyar, executive vice president and general manager, Telco and Edge Cloud Business Unit, VMware, “We are excited to join the 5G Open Innovation Lab as a founding partner to help foster and support this global ecosystem of developers, start-ups, enterprises, academia and government that are focused on helping to provide the benefits of 5G to everyone.”

The Lab announced last week that it has selected 16 companies as members of the second cohort to  participate in its 12-week program. The Lab does not take an equity position in its member companies.

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