Rakuten is gearing up for MWC Barcelona 2026 with a roadmap focused on "Intelligent Growth," signaling a shift toward fully automated, AI-driven telecommunications. The company aims to demonstrate how cloud-native architectures and AI-powered automation can move the needle from theoretical innovation to sustainable revenue streams. At the heart of this strategy is the collaboration between Rakuten Symphony and VEON to rebuild Ukraine’s connectivity infrastructure using open-standard radio access networks.

Beyond high-level strategy, Rakuten’s technical leadership will dive into the mechanics of network resilience and efficiency. Sudhakar Pandey will discuss how Rakuten Mobile uses Open RAN to lower costs while maintaining high quality, while other sessions explore the role of digital twins—virtual replicas of physical systems used for real-time simulation and monitoring. These twins allow operators to predict failures and optimize safety without disrupting live services.

The event will also serve as a stage for Rakuten’s "autonomous journey," showcasing how 5G networks can manage themselves through sophisticated software layers. By integrating AI across the radio access network and operations systems, Rakuten intends to prove that the future of connectivity lies in ecosystems that are not just connected, but inherently intelligent and self-optimizing. This approach represents a significant inflection point for an industry traditionally reliant on proprietary, hardware-heavy systems.

Rakuten is gearing up for MWC Barcelona 2026 with a roadmap focused on "Intelligent Growth," signaling a shift toward fully automated, AI-driven telecommunications. The company aims to demonstrate how cloud-native architectures and AI-powered automation can move the needle from theoretical innovation to sustainable revenue streams. At the heart of this strategy is the collaboration between Rakuten Symphony and VEON to rebuild Ukraine’s connectivity infrastructure using open-standard radio access networks.

Beyond high-level strategy, Rakuten’s technical leadership will dive into the mechanics of network resilience and efficiency. Sudhakar Pandey will discuss how Rakuten Mobile uses Open RAN to lower costs while maintaining high quality, while other sessions explore the role of digital twins—virtual replicas of physical systems used for real-time simulation and monitoring. These twins allow operators to predict failures and optimize safety without disrupting live services.

The event will also serve as a stage for Rakuten’s "autonomous journey," showcasing how 5G networks can manage themselves through sophisticated software layers. By integrating AI across the radio access network and operations systems, Rakuten intends to prove that the future of connectivity lies in ecosystems that are not just connected, but inherently intelligent and self-optimizing. This approach represents a significant inflection point for an industry traditionally reliant on proprietary, hardware-heavy systems.