eBooks

FierceWireless.com 8 7 M AY 2 0 14 M AY 2 0 14 FierceWireless Operators are at various stages of SDN deployment and standards bodies are accelerating their efforts to ensure commercial success. Given all the technology iterations the U.S. wireless industry has witnessed over the years, it's no wonder operators want to migrate to a software-driven approach. Enter Software Defined Networks (SDN). While it made its big debut in the data center industry, the concepts behind SDN are driving mobile network operators to rethink how they do things in the network. Alongside Network Functions Virtualization (NFV), they're eyeing SDN in a big way to help them make the transformation to a nimbler, more cost-friendly environment. VARIOUS STAGES OF ANALYSIS, DEPLOYMENT Operators around the world are at various stages of SDN deployment. NTT Communications has gone so far as to advertise its SDN-based cloud services to consumers of in-flight airplane magazines. Yet a lot of carriers are keeping their SDN/NFV projects close to the vest because they don't want their competitors to know exactly what they're doing. Analysts say a lot of work is going on in labs to evaluate things like the virtualized Evolved Packet Core (vEPC). In the United States, AT&T has been one of the more vocal operators to share its plans to move to SDN with its Domain 2.0 program. Executives have U.S. Outlook for SDN: Onward and Upward BY MONIC A A L L E V E N acknowledged, however, that there is a period of time when the operator will be in the 1.5 stage while it makes the transition from Domain 1.0 to 2.0. Even they can't be sure how long the transition stage will last. During a 2014 Open Networking Summit keynote, John Donovan, senior executive vice president of technology and network operations at AT&T, said what AT&T is looking for in 2014 are "beachhead projects" that can move it from the old Domain 1.0 to Domain 2.0. The company isn't getting too specific on cap-ex guidance except to say that in the next five years, it expects its Domain 2.0 program to "reflect a downward bias" toward capital spending. Other operators are working with standards bodies like the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) and other groups on open-source architectures that multiple vendors can supply, as well as proof-of-concept demonstrations. By 2015, the Yankee Group expects 40 percent of service providers will have production SDN and NFV in their data center networks. In 2016, 70 percent of service providers will have production NFV implementations, and 30 percent will have production SDN implementations in their mobile networks. NOT SO SLOW ANYMORE? With SDN and NFV, "if anything, the pace has picked up really, really fast on thinking about how this can solve their business problems," said Sanjeev Mervana, senior director of service provider marketing for Cisco's SDN and NFV solutions. "It's not just about technology but solving their business challenges." "They're not just talking," Mervana said, noting the proof- of-concept work that's going on in labs. "There's a lot of business transformation occurring on how our customers' customers are buying from our customer, which is the service provider, and that's what's driving the change and the adoption level. I think more than technology--both SDN and NFV, it allows them to solve their specific business challenges." Yet even for all the gung-ho attitudes about moving to a better networking system, Open Networking Foundation (ONF) Executive Director Dan Pitt said he still hears some push back. In response to discussions about taking the control plane out of every switch and router and putting it in a logically centralized place, there are people who say that leaves a single point of failure. His response? No. 1, the telecom world has used centralized controls for circuit switching for 100 years, and No. 2, every online service uses redundant servers. The ONF and the ETSI in March struck a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to collaborate on specific areas pertinent to both SDN and NFV. The goal of "It's not just about technology but solving their business challenges." SANJEEV MERVANA, SENIOR DIRECTOR OF SERVICE PROVIDER MARKETING FOR CISCO'S SDN AND NFV SOLUTIONS

• Cover