Nokia has been selected by Telia Company as the exclusive provider of 5G RAN in Finland adding to its 5G standalone (SA) core customer base in Denmark, Estonia, Lithuania, Norway and Sweden in the Nordic and Baltic regions.

The Telia deal in a five-year contractthat includes the modernization of legacy networks and will cover 7,500 sites. Nokia is a long-standing strategic partner to Telia Company and has also been chosen as the supplier

Nokia will supply Telia with its AirScale portfolio including 5G RAN, AirScale base stations and Nokia AirScale radio access products. The deal will see the modernization of existing radio networks, as well as the rollout of 5G in Finland.

Nokia’s 5G core and Cloud Packet Core (CPC) portfolios will also supply Telia with a 5G SA core network, an expansion of the current core network from Nokia. Building upon Telia’s existing Control/User Plane Separation (CUPS) core network architecture, Nokia’s CPC’s appliance solution will be used in the 5G SA user plane, making it highly scalable.

Nokia’s core solution allows Telia to build a unified core network offering quad-access (2/3/4/5G) services for a seamless experience to their subscribers.

Telia opened the first pre-commercial 5G networks in Helsinki, Vantaa and Oulu in Finland in September 2018 together with Nokia.

The commercial network was opened at the beginning of 2019, and the accelerated roll-out has continued to 42 cities in Finland, with a population coverage of over 25 percent.