"Japan's internet giant Rakuten is building a 100% virtualized next generation network which will pave the way for it to launch a 5G Standalone (SA) network. Rakuten believes 5G NR SA is the real deal similar to China Mobile's view and would like to use 'network slicing' to build differentiated services and targeted customer experiences. Watch out for this trend where MVNOs, Internet companies without any legacy network baggage can launch a fully virtualized advanced mobile network and leapfrog traditional operators with broader scale differentiated internet services." – Neil Shah