Mirantis to Democratize Connectivity with Magma, a Converged Access Gateway Developed by Facebook

Open-source Magma is integrated with Mirantis Cloud Platform to give network operators an open, cost effective foundation for next generation mobile networks 

Magma Developer Conference, Menlo Park, CA, September 9, 2019 —

Today, Mirantis announced that it is helping to bring the open-source converged access gateway software platform Magma, developed by Facebook, to mobile operators around the world. Mirantis has worked over the last six months to integrate, test and certify Magma with Mirantis’ Kubernetes-based infrastructure edge offering, called MCP Edge.

Unlike the core infrastructure that is generally uniform and centralized, edge infrastructure consists of many points of presence with architecture varying as a function of proximity to the end user and the type of application. MCP Edge integrates OpenStack, Kubernetes and Mirantis’ flexible infrastructure manager, DriveTrain, empowering operators to deploy a combination of container, VM and bare metal points of presence (POPs) connected by a unified management plane.

Magma is an open-source software platform designed to seamlessly integrate with the existing evolved packet core back end of a mobile network operator and extend it with new capabilities at the network edge, such as carrier Wi-Fi or EPC as-a-service. Run Magma’s centralized cloud-based controller on a public or private cloud environment, and start with just a single site.

“New entrants into the mobile operator space like Reliance Jio have been able to quickly capture huge market share by building networks at 20% the cost of traditional players and then passing these savings to the consumers,” said Boris Renski, co-founder and CMO, Mirantis. “Network virtualization and open source building blocks are key to achieving these savings. Mirantis already helped some of the biggest operators virtualize their network infrastructure using open standards. Offering services and support for Magma will help us take this further and help mobile operators launch new edge and 5G services cost effectively.”  

The certified combination of MCP Edge and Magma converged access gateway will:

• Enable operators to manage their networks more efficiently with more automation, less downtime, better predictability, and more agility to add new services and applications

• Enable federation between existing mobile network operators and new infrastructure providers for expanding rural infrastructure

• Allow operators who are constrained with licensed spectrum to add capacity and reach by using Wi-Fi and CBRS

“In order to bring affordable internet access to underserved areas of the world, we work to empower telecom companies and vendors with carrier grade, open source software for building next generation mobile networks,” said Amar Padmanabhan, Magma team lead at Facebook. “Mirantis’ experience and capabilities in building open source-based carrier networks make them an excellent partner to collaborate with on this journey.”

This news comes on the heels of Mirantis’ recent collaboration with core contributors of the Airship community by integrating much of the code into Mirantis Cloud Platform (MCP). Airship takes advantage of Kubernetes to define a unified, declarative and cloud-native way for operators to manage containerized software delivery of cloud infrastructure services.

If you are interested in learning more about Mirantis’ involvement in the Magma project, Mirantis will be hosting a webinar on September 24th at 10am. You can register here.