ur, N., Boutros, S., and Aggarwal, R. (November 2011). MPLS on-demand connectivity verification and route tracing. Available at: www.ietf.org (accessed May 29, 2020). 69 Weingarten, Y., Bryant, S., Ceccarelli, D., Caviglia, D., Fondelli, F., Corsi, M., Wu, B., and Dai, X. (July 2013). Applicability of MPLS transport profile for ring topologies. Available at: www.ietf.org (accessed May 29, 2020). 70 Grossman, E. (Ed.) (May 2019). Deterministic networking use cases. Available at: WWW .ietf.org (accessed May 29, 2020). 71 Finn, N., Thubert, P., Varga, B., and Farkas, J. (October 2019). Deterministic networking architecture. Available at: www.ietf.org (accessed May 29, 2020). 72 Geva, A. and Stein, Y. (March 2016). US patent 'PLUGGABLE MASTER CLOCK. NG-RAN Deployment Considerations Andreas Neubacher1 and Vishwanath Ramamurthi2 Superscript(1)-Deutsche Telekom, Austria 2Verizon Communications Inc., USA Introduction In the present chapter we describe various issues for an operator to consider when deploy- ing the cellular network. With the understanding that the choices operators are facing are bigger than just RAN (e.g. spectrum and radio technology choices being the other obvious examples), here we focus on RAN-related decisions, as the main focus of the book. Generally, the cellular network operator's objective is to provide services to the customer, fulfilling the required demands in the most efficient and economical way. To this end, operators acquire spectrum, build networks, and deploy services that they believe will be attractive to users. Here we attempt to illustrate how operators' goals can be fulfilled using various technologies described in the book, the practical constraints that operators may face, and how these affect the choice of NG-RAN deployment options and architectures described in the book. In reality, these decisions are more complex and often involve other non-technical considerations, which go beyond the scope of this book. In the past, the range of services offered by operators was rather limi