TECHNICAL
on, joining these together to form seamless, integrated processes.
deployed (which requires site visits, scheduling, work orders, alignment with health and safety regulations and much more). The network core needs to be allocated (a dedicated deployment, or a partition of another); …the list goes on. But, it doesn’t stop there – a private network will be designed to meet very specific performance goals (otherwise, a public macro network would probably suffice…). This means that performance must be assured, with real-time monitoring and optimisation through feedback loops – and backed by an appropriate SLA. All of these are familiar processes – but customers requiring private networks will expect agile delivery and activation, while meeting the required SLAs. Already, some are experimenting with online service requests that trigger the deployment of slices to support discrete use cases in given locations – the full realisation of dynamic network provisioning isn’t far off. But that requires hyperautomation to deliver those goals. In essence, if CSPs are to target this opportunity effectively and to create profitable private network businesses, they must contain costs and automate to the greatest extent possible. Hyperautomation with We Are CORTEX The CORTEX platform provides hyperautomation software, tailored for telecoms and aligned with the requisite mandated governance. It enables frictionless transformation from legacy processes to hyperautomated, agile systems that are dynamic, efficient, cost effective, and free from human intervention and error. It also ensures compliance with all regulatory requirements. CORTEX enables automation at the workflow, process and hyper level. It provides a pathway to hyperautomation, via graceful implementation of discrete automations – and the joining together and orchestration of these to span different processes. You can start with a simple task, such as automating the response to selected network alarms and triggers, and move
checks before launch. This, of course, can all be automated – but does this equate to hyperautomation? Consider then the requirement to link that process to ensuring the correct security procedures are followed and compliance obligations are met, recording the updates in the correct logs and work orders, tracking version control, enabling the authorisation of engineers to intervene (should that become necessary), and often executing either the entire engineering processes, or, if nothing else, just the pre and post change stages, and so on. At that point we are in fact hyperautomating. Essentially, hyperautomation in this case is providing the organisational goal to deliver zero-touch remote updates AND to do so in accordance with the security and governance processes required – both in terms of compliance and internal organisational requirements. In other words, its unifying different processes into a coordinated whole. A more complex example would be private networks. The adoption of private networks is booming. Private networks will enable new use cases for CSPs and operators, and drive new revenue opportunities – exactly the sort of opportunities telcos are seeking to target and for which they want to ensure optimum costs and from which they will hope to maximise profits. According to IoT analysts at Berg Insight, for example, there were an estimated 4,700 private LTE/5G live networks deployed globally by the end of 2024, with a market value of around $1.8 billion in 2024 that’s predicted to grow to $8.9 billion by 2029 2 . One of the leading suppliers in the space is, according to Gartner, Vodafone 3 – a major automation customer of We Are CORTEX. Delivering private networks (and network slices, where required) is a highly complex process. For example, license conditions need to be checked, according to the local regulatory conditions; the RAN infrastructure needs to be planned to meet the local topography and architecture; antennae need to be
Our platform uses process microservices – which means that CORTEX comes with more than 200 pre-built Function Blocks, each providing discrete atomic functions that can be connected as needed to meet automation requirements. Because flows are reusable, the automations they enable can be repurposed (or accessed) by other processes that need them, at no additional cost – lowering the cost of hyperautomation. It makes it possible to build and combine atomic functions
and integrate them to build cross- domain orchestration and achieve hyperautomation.
In fact, hyperautomation with We Are CORTEX also allows CSPs to retain all existing automations – but super-charges them by enabling connection to different, but related, processes, across all relevant workflows in the organisation. There is no need to rip and replace functioning automations. Instead, the jump to hyperautomation is smoothed – new hyperautomations can exist in harmony with other automations that are then gradually interconnected. The step to hyperautomation is also necessary if climbing to Level 4 in the TMF’s autonomous networks model is an ambition. Hyperautomation may at first seem to be complex, revolutionary and costly. But, in reality, hyperautomation is actually a series of automations that can be adopted incrementally. The We Are CORTEX approach means you achieve the goal of hyperautomation, but with a manageable journey that delivers incremental benefits at every step – it’s not revolutionary at all, it’s evolutionary. So, it’s not hyperautomation instead of automation; it’s automation to achieve hyperautomation, all of which can be enabled by We Are CORTEX – accelerating your journey along the TMF automation maturity model.
www.wearecortex.com
1 https://www.gartner.com/en/information-technology/glossary/hyperautomation 2 https://www.iot-now.com/2024/12/06/148416-over-4700-private-lte-5g-networks-deployed-globally-byend-of-2024/, citing https://www.berginsight.com/the-private-lte5g- network-market 3 https://www.vodafone.com/business/news-and-insights/analyst-views/vodafone-named-a-leader-inthe-2025-gartner-magic-quadrant-for-4g-and-5g-private-mobile-services
May 2025 Volume 47 No.2
97
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