Rakuten Mobile wins big at Leading Lights Awards 2019

Rakuten Mobile is well on its way to launching the world’s first end-to-end fully virtualized cloud-native 5G-ready mobile network – and the telecoms industry is taking notice.

The trailblazing new network picked up a pair of honors at this year’s Leading Lights Awards, which recognize the industry’s top companies and executives for outstanding achievements in next-generation communications technology, applications, services, strategies and innovation.

Rakuten Mobile received the award for Most Innovative Telco Cloud Strategy (Network/Data Center Operator), awarded to the network or data center operator that has devised the most innovative telco cloud strategy during the past year. The company won for its Telco Cloud Platform, which Leading Lights called “a truly next-generation, software-defined, automated and distributed telco architecture.”

It also took home the trophy for Most Innovative Automation Strategy (Network/Data Center Operator), recognizing the network or data center operator that has devised the most innovative automation strategy during the past year. The company won for its “mobile network platform, developed and deployed with help from Cisco, that has in-built automated processes from the radio access to the core.”

Rakuten Mobile was the only company to win multiple awards at the event.

“I’m truly honored for Rakuten Mobile to receive these Leading Lights awards, both of which highlight the talent, hard work and innovative thinking of our team and all of our partners,” said Tareq Amin, chief technology officer (CTO) of Rakuten Mobile Network. “We started out with a plan to offer consumers a simpler, better quality service by bringing disruptive innovation to mobile, and it’s very exciting to see the industry recognize our commitment in this way.”

Leading Lights is powered by Light Reading, an independent digital media platform providing daily news, analysis and insights for the global communications networking and services industry. Winners were chosen following the judging of hundreds of submissions in 22 categories, which in 2019 included recognition for those companies making progress in 5G, AI/Analytics, edge computing, blockchain, SD-WAN, Telco Cloud and more.

With Rakuten Mobile slated to launch in October 2019, the industry and consumers will undoubtedly be watching—keen to see what comes next.

For more about Rakuten’s mission to build the world’s first end-to-end fully virtualized cloud-native network, visit here.