One embodiment is directed to an open radio access network to provide wireless coverage for a plurality of cells at a site and that comprises a virtualized headend comprising one or more base-station nodes and a plurality of unified remote units deployed at the site. Each of the unified remote units is able to support multiple functional splits, multiple wireless interface protocols, multiple generations of radio access technology, and multiple frequency bands. The unified remote units and functional split used to serve each cell can be changed (for example, on-the-fly as a part of an automatic or manual adaptation process that is a function of one or more monitored performance attributes of the open radio access network such as network bandwidth, network latency, processing load, or processing performance). The unified remote units can be implemented in a modular manner with a backplane to which different radio modules can be coupled.