Campus5G: A Campus Scale Private 5G Open RAN Testbed

TL;DR

Campus5G is a pioneering campus-wide private 5G testbed based on Open RAN standards, demonstrating deployment, performance measurement, and offering insights for future research in private 5G networks.

Contribution

This paper details the development, deployment, and evaluation of the first campus-scale Open RAN private 5G testbed, providing valuable insights and lessons learned.

Findings

Successful deployment of a campus-wide private 5G testbed

Performance metrics and measurement results

Identified research opportunities in private 5G networks

Abstract

Mobile networks are embracing disaggregation, reflected by the industry trend towards Open RAN. Private 5G networks are viewed as particularly suitable contenders as early adopters of Open RAN, owing to their setting, high degree of control, and opportunity for innovation they present. Motivated by this, we have recently deployed Campus5G, the first of its kind campus-wide, O-RAN-compliant private 5G testbed across the central campus of the University of Edinburgh. We present in detail our process developing the testbed, from planning, to architecting, to deployment, and measuring the testbed performance. We then discuss the lessons learned from building the testbed, and highlight some research opportunities that emerged from our deployment experience.