DeepSig Opens OCUDU Lab to Accelerate Open-Source AI-RAN for 6G

New Arlington lab gives operators, engineers, and government partners a place to see AI running live on OCUDU.

ARLINGTON, Va.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--DeepSig, a pioneer in AI-native wireless communications, has opened its OCUDU AI-RAN Lab at its Arlington, Virginia headquarters. The lab gives operators, engineers, and government partners a place to see AI working in the 5G radio access network (RAN) on OCUDU, the open-source centralized unit (CU) and distributed unit (DU) software DeepSig helps lead, before they commit to it in their own networks. OCUDU is also designed as a development path for 6G. The lab opened on Oct. 19 at a ribbon-cutting event marking DeepSig's 10th anniversary.

"Open source is changing how operators evaluate new RAN technology," said DeepSig CEO and Co-Founder Jim Shea. "With the OCUDU Lab, operators and engineers can see and evaluate AI-native capabilities running on an open CU/DU stack, ask hard questions, and decide what fits their networks."

OCUDU provides a vendor-neutral, open-source foundation for the CU and DU software at the core of the RAN. By giving the industry common software to build on, it is designed to reduce fragmentation and help new capabilities, including AI, move faster from experimentation to deployment.

The OCUDU Lab brings that work into one place. Visitors can see the AI-RAN capabilities DeepSig has developed for OCUDU running end-to-end on real radios – delivering measurable spectral efficiency gains and new integrated sensing and communications (ISAC) functionality.

DeepSig leads OCUDU's AI-RAN Working Group and has open-sourced the interface that lets AI distributed applications (dApps) run inside the network, giving the OCUDU community a common and interoperable foundation for rapid AI-RAN development. Through the working group, the company has also contributed a suite of reference dApps and has deployed its own AI-RAN applications and dApps with demonstrated multi-vendor support.

"We built this lab to validate AI-RAN end-to-end over the air—using real radios, commercial devices, and realistic deployment hardware and conditions to prove that the performance gains on OCUDU are real and compelling," said DeepSig CTO and Co-Founder Tim O’Shea. "Our goal is to give operators proven results they can trust to take straight into field trials, helping accelerate practical AI-RAN adoption globally."

DeepSig has helped lead OCUDU since the program began. In September 2025, DeepSig was awarded a contract under the National Spectrum Consortium (NSC) Spectrum Forward OTA, on behalf of the FutureG Office within the Office of the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering (OUSD(R&E)), to help deliver a carrier-grade, open-source CU and DU software stack for 5G, 6G and AI-RAN.

In March 2026, DeepSig became a founding member of the OCUDU Ecosystem Foundation. Development continues under an initial three-year funded program, with new capabilities released on an ongoing basis.

Operators, engineers, researchers, and government partners can schedule a visit to the OCUDU Lab or request a live demonstration of DeepSig’s benchmarked AI-RAN and sensing workloads by contacting [e-mail].

About DeepSig, Inc.

DeepSig is a pioneer in AI native wireless communications. Its transformative technology pushes the boundaries of spectrum sensing, wireless performance and network capabilities. Drawing on a unique blend of expertise in deep learning, wireless systems and signal processing, DeepSig’s AI/ML powered software enhances security, efficiency and capacity for tactical and commercial wireless communications in licensed or shared radio spectrum, and in existing 5G Open RAN or AI native next generation networks.