Operators want open source software and they want OCP hardware, or so they say. It would seem that the trend overall is to stamp out vendors, but of course neither of these things really stamp out vendor relationships. They might have an impact on the buyer/seller relationship, though, and on the way that operators buy…
At the TMF event in Nice Verizon opened yet another discussion, or perhaps I should say “reopened” because the topic came up way back in April 2013 and it was just as divisive then. It’s the topic of “microservices” or breaking down virtual functions into very small components. NetCracker also had some things to say…
There is an inescapable conclusion to be drawn from recent industry announcements: Vendors have lost control of SDN and NFV, which means they’ve lost control of the evolution of networking. Operators, in a state of self-described frustration with their vendors’ support for transformation goals, have taken matters into their own hands. I’ve gotten emails over…
One of the most logical places for operator interest in open-source software to focus is in the area of virtual network functions (VNFs). Most of the popular functions are available in at least one open-source implementation, and operators have been grousing over the license terms for commercial VNFs. It would seem that an open-source model…
These are the times that try the souls of networking sales management. Most of you know that I have an ongoing dialog with salespeople in many companies, and that dialog says that network spending overall is under pressure. Legacy infrastructure investment is slow-rolling because of ROI issues, and vendors who have presented next-gen architectures have…
How can we best accommodate the notion of virtualization to the application of IoT? That’s a question that more and more operators and vendors are wrestling with, and it’s a good one. The answer might be interesting and disruptive—think less about virtualizing the network and more about virtualizing the “things”, the sensors and controllers. I’m…
Let us suppose for a moment that the goal of operators is to reduce equipment and operations cost in concert and at the same time increase their ability to provision current services quickly and flexibly, and develop new services just as quickly. Let us further suppose that they have addressed the higher-level operations/portal implications of…
With the exception of Huawei, network equipment vendors are facing tightening spending by operators. The reason, obviously, is that compression in profit-per-bit that I’ve been talking about—the compression that’s led to operator support for “transformation” and their interest in SDN and NFV. Since SDN and NFV have not evolved fast enough and far enough to…
The issue of operationalizing next gen networks and services is critical for operators, and it’s thus fitting to close this week’s review of the Verizon architecture with comments on OSS/BSS integration. There are two questions to be answered; can the approach deal with the efficiency/agility goals that will have to be met to justify SDN/NFV,…
It has always been my view that NFV would be better and more efficient if there were a common modeling approach from the top layer of services to the bottom layer of infrastructure. I still feel that way, but I have serious doubts on whether such a happy situation can now arise. The service-centric advance…