NEC XON has created an Experience Centre at its Midrand head office in South Africa, where customers can test use cases and business models for emerging technologies such as 5G Open RAN.

The Experience Centre also includes demonstrations and testing facilities for integrated or stand-alone solutions such as sustainable energy, digital self-service, know your customer (KYC), and communications infrastructure.

“We know that the pace of new technology developments is extremely fast and advances can be significant,” says Johann Coetzee, executive VP of NEC XON. “That can make it difficult for customers to predict the business case and supporting architecture, particularly where there is no commercial precedent, which is why we developed the Experience Centre. It is a demonstration and sandbox environment that enables customers to create, test and develop the use cases they want to explore before they provide significant investment.”

A prime example is the 5G Open RAN platform NEC XON offers in the new Experience Centre.

“There are many use cases for 5G Open RAN,” says Wally Beelders, executive of communications solutions at NEC XON. “From industrial automation to smart cities, the top 15 also include the Open RAN multi-vendor environment for mobile operators, network slicing, and private 5G.”

5G Open RAN can deliver high throughput solutions for metro environments as well as low-cost rural deployments. Network slicing enables multiple operators to share infrastructure. Private 5G helps mobile operators to position services into new markets that include mining, enterprise or high-density commercial organisations via regional or campus setups. Customers can test all of these.

NEX EXON has spent two years developing the 5G Open RAN capabilities of the Experience Centre. There is no other facility like this in Africa and it took significant investment in skills and resources to establish Africa’s first 5G Open RAN platform where customers can test future use cases.

The Experience Centre additionally demonstrates the capabilities of NEC XON’s digital self-service KYC solution that incorporates digital kiosks, identity verification, connectivity, security, maintenance and support.

A key attribute is that they harness the power of biometric verification, which means they help businesses to meet regulatory requirements and are extremely powerful extensions of customer experience processes.

All types of customers can get the full experience of how these solutions may impact their businesses in various ways - from new customer experiences to streamlined operations, cost-reductions, service delivery enhancements, and logistics and supply improvements. Different sectors use these solutions differently. Government would typically deploy digital self-service for citizen services, the education sector for faculty, student and visitor services, and mobile networks for services.”