Mavenir's Converged Packet Core is now live in Rakuten Mobile’s mobile network, enabling a new nationwide emergency roaming service in Japan.

The Texas-headquartered vendor deployed its packet core on Rakuten’s Cloud Platform to assist Rakuten in providing multicarrier roaming as part of "Japan Roaming" emergency service.

The roaming service was launched by the country’s leading mobile carriers on April 1 to assist in the event of large-scale disasters. It works by enabling users to temporarily connect to another domestic carrier’s 4G LTE network if their primary service is disrupted by a major outage.

The service supports 4G LTE voice, text messaging, and data services, with an emergency calls-only mode securing continued access to Japan’s key services.

“Mobile connectivity becomes critical when normal life is disrupted. Mavenir’s cloud-native packet core plays an important part in Rakuten Mobile’s role in Japan Roaming, enabling flexible and reliable connectivity when it’s needed most,” Ryo Watanabe, GM of the core network department at Rakuten Mobile, noted in a statement. “This is an example of how state-of-the-art network architecture can support society in even the most testing of circumstances.”

Mavenir said its cloud-native packet core provides scalable, resilient data foundation required for Rakuten Mobile to support cross-carrier access under emergency conditions. It highlighted this use as an example for how cloud-based core networks can strengthen national communications infrastructure and support service continuity at scale.

Mavenir’s portfolio is designed to scale with operators’ evolving service and resilience requirements with the continued support of voice, data, messaging, fraud protection, and security. This approach to software-based architecture is also promised to offer mobile operators flexibility to introduce new services faster, automate operations, and respond promptly when conditions change.

Previous network collaborations

The development is a continuation of Mavenir’s long-standing partnership with Rakuten Mobile, with previous collaborations including the deployment of Mavenir’s cloud-native voice and messaging capabilities for Rakuten's Link communications app.

In another Japan-based partnership, Rakuten Mobile and Fujitsu subsidiary 1Finity recently announced an open radio access network (RAN) collaboration to deploy massive multiple-input, multiple-output (MIMO) radios. The radio units (RUs) were designed by Fujitsu’s networking arm for full-scale deployment in Japan and are based on Qualcomm Dragonwing QRU100 platforms, following in the footsteps of Qualcomm-based RAN deployments from the likes of Verizon.

Mavenir realigned its business structure in December 2025, revamping its leadership suite in an attempt to steer an AI-powered course toward operational stability. This realigned operating structure is based on “two integrated business segments, both with a shared focus on AI automation”.

One of the units integrated Mavenir’s packet core, messaging, and security operations, with the other integrating its voice and radio access technologies, both supported by “platform [and] cloud technologies and business solutions."

“This structure brings clearer accountability, sharper customer focus, and faster execution across product lines and [research and development],” Mavenir noted in a statement at the time.