Orange France and Samsung Establish a Strategic Partnership Focused on vRAN and Open RAN with a First Pilot in the Field

SEOUL, Korea – July 3, 2025 – Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. and Orange France, one of Europe’s leading telecommunications operators, announced the companies have successfully completed the first 4G and 5G calls on Orange France’s virtualized RAN (vRAN) and Open RAN network in a city in southwestern France. By leveraging Samsung’s versatile vRAN solutions, Orange France has enhanced its network capabilities benefiting from the increased flexibility and innovation offered by vRAN and Open RAN.

This pilot marks a significant step forward in the strategic partnership between Orange and Samsung, highlighting their shared commitment to accelerating the shift toward a more open, software-based architecture optimized for today’s fast-evolving networks. Introducing Samsung’s revolutionary solutions into its network is also a part of Orange’s strategy to diversify its supplier ecosystem, paving the way to fostering a richer and healthier ecosystem.

Before proceeding to the field testing, the companies conducted rigorous tests in the Orange labs in Lyon, demonstrating technical and operational readiness. The first 4G and 5G calls on Orange France’s pilot network proved Samsung’s robust and mature vRAN technology. Throughout the field tests, the observed performance showed strong potential for high-quality and reliable network delivery in future live deployments. Now, the companies are advancing to the next stage as they plan expansion to additional sites in southwest and western parts of France by the end of 2025. 

For this field project, Samsung provided its market-leading vRAN solutions with multi-generational support, O-RAN compliant triple-band radios for low- and mid- bands (700MHz, 800MHz, 900MHz, 1.8GHz, 2.1GHz and 2.6GHz), and 3.5GHz 32T32R Massive MIMO radios. Its offerings also include Samsung CognitiV Network Operations Suite (NOS), a set of diverse AI applications and software solutions, including an AI-powered Service Management Orchestration (SMO). This simplifies network automation and enables Zero Touch Provisioning (ZTP), ultimately helping Orange France rapidly adopt new technologies and emerging services in the network.

Samsung’s vRAN features intelligent automation, AI integration and advanced energy saving functionalities that will allow operators to further enhance their network capabilities, increase energy efficiency, and open up new opportunities to modernize their network infrastructure across multiple regions.

“This first call on a virtualized RAN in France, based on Samsung technology, paves the way for our future cloud RAN deployment,” said Emmanuel Lugagne Delpon, CTO Networks at Orange France. “This important milestone is the result of an efficient cooperation between Samsung and Orange teams, and the promise to get new achievements through this partnership.”

“Our latest work with Orange France is another addition to the array of successful innovations Samsung has introduced in Europe,” said June Moon, Executive Vice President, Head of R&D, Networks Business at Samsung Electronics. “We are proud to take part in Orange France’s journey toward next-generation networks. Samsung’s globally proven vRAN and Open RAN solutions will not only provide high-quality and reliable connectivity, but also offer the optimal ground for bringing transformative technologies like AI to the network in France.”

Building on its robust vRAN and Open RAN ecosystem, Samsung is collaborating with industry-leading partners―Dell Technologies (servers), Intel (processors) and Wind River (cloud platform) for this pilot project.

The companies’ collaboration follows their remarkable milestone of achieving the industry’s first 2G vRAN call in a shared Open RAN network in Romania last year. Through Samsung’s flexible vRAN and Open RAN, operators can advance wide-scale network sharing adoption in Europe to reduce hardware costs, power consumption and the need for duplicate sites.

Samsung has pioneered the successful delivery of 5G end-to-end solutions, including chipsets, radios and cores. Through ongoing research and development, Samsung drives the industry to advance 5G networks with its market-leading product portfolio, from purpose-built RAN, vRAN, Open RAN, and core to private network solutions and AI-powered automation tools and applications. The company currently provides innovative network solutions to mobile operators and enterprises that deliver boundless connectivity to hundreds of millions of users worldwide.

About Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd.

Samsung inspires the world and shapes the future with transformative ideas and technologies. The company is redefining the worlds of TVs, digital signage, smartphones, wearables, tablets, home appliances and network systems, as well as memory, system LSI and foundry. Samsung is also advancing medical imaging technologies, HVAC solutions and robotics, while creating innovative automotive and audio products through Harman. With its SmartThings ecosystem, open collaboration with partners, and integration of AI across its portfolio, Samsung delivers a seamless and intelligent connected experience. For the latest news, please visit the Samsung Newsroom at news.samsung.com