The Governments of the UK, Australia, Canada and the US have published a joint statement on telecommunications supplier diversity, setting out their joint commitment to working together on secure and resilient telecoms supply chains, including for 5G and 6G.

The statement sets out initiatives that will seek to guide the governments’ shared efforts on telecommunications supplier diversity, including building on the UK’s principles for the development of Open RAN, published earlier this year, which the Government describes as a new breed of telecoms kit allowing providers to “mix and match” solutions from multiple vendors, currently not possible under existing network setups.

In the UK Government’s view, the joint statement will send a clear signal to telecoms firms across the world about how the four countries would like to see the benefits of Open RAN realised and will boost efforts to reduce the world’s dependency on a small number of telecoms companies to build and maintain 5G and future networks and help open up the global market to new entrants. To read the Government’s press release in full and for access to the joint statement, click here.