One of the challenges that packet networks faced from the first is the question of “services”. Unlike TDM which dedicates resources to services, packet networks multiplex traffic and thus rely more on what could be called “statistical guarantees” or “grade of service” than on specific SLAs. Today, it’s fair to say that there are two…
With all the ink net neutrality is getting, I feel like I just have to say something about it. Regulatory policy, after all, is perhaps the largest single factor in setting business policies for network operators and so one of the largest factors in setting capex policies too. Since I’ve blogged before on the broad…
PR often follows a very predictable cycle. When you launch a new technology, the novelty (which is what “news” means) drives a wave of interest, hype, and exaggeration. Whatever this new thing is, it becomes the singlehanded savior of western culture, perhaps life as we know it. Eventually all the positive story lines run out,…
One of the ongoing themes in both SDN and NFV is that operators need these technologies to compete with the OTT players. We also hear that operators need a cultural transformation to do that, or that they need to form subsidiaries or buy somebody. We could almost claim to have a cottage industry here, people…
There are, as you’re all aware at this point, a lot of open questions in the SDN and NFV world. Recently I covered one of them, the operations impact of both technologies. While that’s undoubtedly the most significant open issue, it’s not the only one. Another is the broad question of how networks and network…
Cloud computing is probably the most important concept of our time, but also likely the most misunderstood. It will never do what proponents say it will—displace private IT. In fact, it’s not likely it will displace more than about a quarter of today’s IT spending. However, it will generate new spending and in the end…
I’ve talked a quite bit in 2014 about the operations issues of NFV, but much less about the issues associated with SDN. We’re at the end of the year now, and so I’d like to rectify that in part at least by addressing SDN operationalization now. There are links to NFV, of course, but also…
There are a lot of illusions in life, and thus not surprisingly in networking. One of the illusions is that there is great opportunity to be had by generating on-demand high-capacity services. Another, possibly related to the first, is that there’s a high value to vertically integrating the operation of networks from the service layer…
We’ve now looked at all of the classes of players who might be transformative influences on the road to NGN. I hope that the exploration brought out some critical points, but in case they didn’t this is a good time to sum them up. We’re heading into 2015, the year that just might be the…
You generally find revolutionaries in coffee shops, not gourmet dining rooms or private clubs. In the race for the right to shape the network of the future, the equivalent of a coffee shop is “second-tier” status. You can see the candy through the window (to mix a metaphor) but can’t quite get at it—unless you…