{"id":1090110,"date":"2024-10-03T03:09:36","date_gmt":"2024-10-03T10:09:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/?post_type=msr-research-item&#038;p=1090110"},"modified":"2025-10-17T11:08:37","modified_gmt":"2025-10-17T18:08:37","slug":"distributed-ai-platform-for-the-6g-ran","status":"publish","type":"msr-research-item","link":"https:\/\/www.microsoft.com\/en-us\/research\/publication\/distributed-ai-platform-for-the-6g-ran\/","title":{"rendered":"Distributed AI Platform for the 6G RAN"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Cellular Radio Access Networks (RANs) are rapidly evolving towards 6G, driven by the need to reduce costs and introduce new revenue streams for operators and enterprises. In this context, AI emerges as a key enabler in solving complex RAN problems spanning both the management and application domains. Unfortunately, and despite the undeniable promise of AI, several practical challenges still remain, hindering the widespread adoption of AI applications in the RAN space. In<br \/>\nthis work, we attempt to shed light to these challenges and argue that existing approaches in addressing them are inadequate for realizing the vision of a truly AI-native 6G network. We propose a distributed AI platform architecture, tailored to the needs of an AI-native RAN.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Cellular Radio Access Networks (RANs) are rapidly evolving towards 6G, driven by the need to reduce costs and introduce new revenue streams for operators and enterprises. In this context, AI emerges as a key enabler in solving complex RAN problems spanning both the management and application domains. Unfortunately, and despite the undeniable promise of AI, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","meta":{"msr-url-field":"","msr-podcast-episode":"","msrModifiedDate":"","msrModifiedDateEnabled":false,"ep_exclude_from_search":false,"_classifai_error":"","msr-author-ordering":[{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Ganesh Ananthanarayanan","user_id":"31834"},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Matthew Balkwill","user_id":"42651"},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Xenofon Foukas","user_id":"39276"},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Zhihua Lai","user_id":"40525"},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Bozidar Radunovic","user_id":"31286"},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Connor Settle","user_id":"42648"},{"type":"user_nicename","value":"Yongguang 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Check our latest demo videos: Check our open source: Virtualization of telco networks is beginning to happen in Radio Access Networks (RAN), especially regarding Open Radio Access Networks (O-RAN). However, there are some obstacles to this trend. The current O-RAN architecture limits programmability to predefined telemetry and control that an xApp can access through existing, standardized service models which may limit the pace of innovation. 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