Japan-based system integrator NEC announced a partnership with Accedian Networks to develop network performance monitoring appliances.

According to NEC, the Accedian partnership was driven by growing network complexity and a desire from enterprises for greater visibility of underlay and overlay networks, especially where it comes to 5G deployments.

At the heart of the arrangement is Accedian's Skylight software suite, which is capable of correlating network data sources to access application performance and diagnose disruptions.

NEC says the combined product is ideally suited for large scale monitoring of mobile backhaul as well as performance management of on-premises and cloud environments for enterprises. In a statement, Mayuko Tatewaki, general manager of the service provider solutions division at NEC, said the partnership will also be key to monitoring 5G network performance.

Today's announcement marks NEC's latest collaboration as it seeks to build out its 5G product line.

Last June, it teamed up with Rakuten Mobile to develop virtual radio access network (vRAN) equipment for 5G services in Japan. Rakuten is on track to enter the Japanese market as a fourth mobile operator using a fully virtualized network core.

NEC through its subsidiary Netcracker more recently struck a deal with Altiostar to jointly develop and market vRAN equipment to battle market giants Ericsson, Huawei, Nokia, and ZTE. Those vendors are also part of the Rakuten deployment in Japan.

While still considered a niche player in Gartner's newly revised Network Performance Monitoring and Diagnostics Magic Quadrant report, Accedian has made significant gains in the space since acquiring Performance Vision in 2017.

In the report, Gartner highlighted the company's ability to execute on challenges faced by multinational enterprises, and its heavy investments in research and development.

However, Gartner cautions that Accedian's offerings have a heavy emphasis on network diagnostics, which can prove troublesome for enterprises in non-troubleshooting use cases. At the same time, Gartner warns Accedian's pricing model remains complex and difficult to predict.