Transformation of a trillion-dollar infrastructure base isn’t going to be easy, and that’s what network operators are facing. Some don’t think it’s even possible, and a Light Reading story outlines Telecom Italia’s thinking on the matter. We seem to be hearing other viewpoints from other operators, so what’s really going on here? There’s always been…
I am just as excited about the potential of 5G as anyone, but I’m also a little worried that we might fall prey to some of the same issues that have hurt SDN, NFV, and IoT. We have a lot of time to get this done right, but we do have to be sure to…
The state of technologies like SDN and NFV is important, but it seems we can get to it only in little snippets or sound bites. A couple of recent ones spoken at conferences come to mind. First, AT&T commented that they wanted VNFs to be like “Legos” and not “snowflakes”, and then we had a…
Everyone by now knows that Ericsson has issued a profit warning, and that many analysts and reporters are wondering whether Ericsson can survive in the long term. I think it’s premature to call Ericsson a member of the walking dead, or even seriously wounded, but I also think that it might be helpful to look…
Google has now followed Amazon and Microsoft (Azure) in deploying cloud tools for IoT. In many ways, the Google announcement is a disappointment to me, because it doubles down on the fundamental mistake of thinking “IoT” is just about getting “things” on the “Internet.” But if you look at the trend in what I call…
The network operator technology planning cycle that typically happens annually between mid-September and mid-November is just getting underway, and I want to share some of the “talking points” operators have told me about. None of these positions are firm this early, but in past years a decent number of the early positions were solidified into…
For the decades where IP dominance was a given, we have lived in an age where service features were network features. When Nicira came along, driven by the need to scale cloud tenancy more than physical devices tended to support, we learned about another model. Overlay networks, networks built from nodes that are connected by…
If software is driving networks and infrastructure, perhaps we need to look more at software architecture in relation to things like the cloud, SDN, and especially NFV. We’re seeing some indication that real thinking is happening, but also some suggestions that further thought is required. Many of you know that I write regularly for Tech…
Just as we enter a critical period for the role of servers in networking, we’re seeing some of the major server players enter a period of transformation. Dell has finalized its EMC/VMware acquisition, and HPE has announced they’re selling off their enterprise software business. These two decisions seem to cement both vendors into a position…
The Huawei announcement of new “Agile Controller 3.0” for SDN raises some interesting issues in the transformation game. Huawei’s press release offers comments like “provides the capabilities of on-demand network resource pool reservation, automatic deployment, intelligent optimization, and bandwidth adjustment on-demand for enterprise customers across campuses, carriers and data center networks” and “The AC 3.0…