Mavenir’s Restructuring Reflects RAN Industry Woes, Retrenching to Telecom Core

Last year, when Mavenir parted ways with John Baker, its Open RAN evangelist, it was pretty clear that Mavenir hadn’t met its plans for its RAN business. This week, it announced a $1.3 billion debt and equity restructuring, and today we learned of its plans to save $400 million per year in expenses, primarily related to its exit from RAN hardware. Today, we asked its CEO, Pardeep Kohli, about its ongoing RAN commitment and, similar to our views, he said that the big Western RAN companies are at risk from Mobile Network Operator (MNO) delays in adopting multi-vendor RAN and more pointedly, at risk from satellite direct-to-cell (D2C) services eating into the MNO customer base. Mavenir, therefore, is recommitting its plans to remain a Telecom Core (IMS, Packet Core, Messaging) company and will continue to offer its Open RAN software stack, both with ongoing enhancements to its portfolio utilizing AI. We believe this “doubling down” on software makes sense. Mavenir’s senior leadership believes the Telecom Core market won’t grow in the future (a view we also share). This is as good as in the 6G era, where satellite will take on a significant component of roaming, and companies shifting now will be better positioned to capture the change in revenue contribution in 6G. To learn more, please reach out, as we have in-depth coverage of Telecom Core, RAN, and Satellite.