For years we have been hearing about how virtualization has revolutionized the enterprise data center, providing a wide range of benefits from both a business and technology standpoint. With the advent of network function virtualization, the movement has moved to the mobile network, allowing the virtualization of network functions into a connected network capable of delivering communications services on top of industry-standard, high-volume servers. This shift promises to offer a host of benefits over the legacy, proprietary hardware that has been the foundation of our communications networks for decades.
Far from a fad, NFV and the software-defined network are getting serious consideration from tier-one operators globally. Case in point: In December, AT&T announced its intent to virtualize and control as much as 75% of its customer-facing network with software by 2020. They see the shift as one that will allow them to significantly reduce capital expenditures while at the same time increase the capacity of their network.
For those of us in the industry, this should come as no surprise. We have seen mobile operators face a variety of challenges, one of the most critical from a business perspective being the declining average revenue per user. This is being exacerbated by the trend of exponential data growth which is forcing operators to continue to add capacity to their networks.
The time to buck conventional wisdom is now
In order to add this capacity, while conventional wisdom might suggest we do more of the same – build bigger boxes that can handle more data, and deploy more of them – now is the time for a new way of thinking.
Legacy mobile data architectures just aren’t economically suited for today’s world of rapid data growth and smart devices. In fact, the “bigger box” approach isn’t just economically irresponsible, it flies in the face of Moore’s Law from a technical perspective, as the commoditization of boxes just can’t keep pace with the traffic growth.
By continuing to attempt to solve the problem with legacy approaches, operators are adding fuel to the fire; spending money for a short-term fix that will soon need addressed again as traffic growth continues. As opposed to “throwing dollars and boxes” at the capacity problem, customers that adopt NFV have the ability to add capacity as part of a step-by-step approach that is as much a benefit to their subscribers as it is to their shareholders.
The ability to adjust to changing traffic patterns dynamically will become increasingly important with the emergence of machine-to-machine communications and the impact it will have on operator networks. Vodafone predicts that by 2020, networks will need to support more than 50 billion connected devices. While we are just beginning to understand how it will impact networks, what we do know is it will involve many connections, with a very low average revenue per user, and the traffic patterns are expected to be “bursty” in nature. As a result, many experts believe that running M2M on a virtualized network that enables them to “dial up and down capacity” will be critical as the impact of M2M becomes more widely understood.
An architecture based on NFV dramatically changes the economics of networks, bringing tremendous service flexibility in a manner that nicely coexists with legacy network investments. Through the virtualization of network functions onto existing data center infrastructure operators can transform the economics of deploying and scaling mobile networks from a capital and operational perspective. What’s more, the benefits aren’t just economic, as this software-driven approach also simplifies the operation of the network, which significantly decreases the length of time required to launch the new service offerings required to create the new revenue streams needed for profitability.
Ready for prime time
The host of benefits provided by NFV aren’t the result of some science project, conducted in clean rooms by men in white coats. NFV is already proving to significantly transform and advance the state of mobile data networks as it possesses real-world “street cred” in the areas of performance, scalability and reliability that operators need to effectively run commercial, production networks.
In fact, early deployments and trials with tier-one mobile operators are demonstrating that new virtualized solutions can now outperform the best legacy products and solutions. Specifically, these deployments are demonstrating a number of compelling truths related to NFV including:
• The fact that a unified, centrally managed, virtualization and cloud architecture is capable of delivering computing resources on demand.
• Proof that NFV can commercially operate across a wide range of industry-standard, high-volume servers.
• Compelling evidence that total cost of ownership can be lowered dramatically due to capital expenditure and operational savings.
NFV: The ability to provide agility
While the discussion of new architectures may seem straightforward, the task of evolving an operator’s business model is anything but. It requires a change of thinking and a network capable of rapid service creation and experimentation.
Operators need to be bold enough to “fail fast” in terms of new services, and must shift the development cycles of these new services from years to hours in order to find the “silver bullet” services capable of driving growth and revenue.
One area in which we are seeing initial traction with this type of approach is the establishment of new mobile virtual network operator brands that are being created as a result of the growing consumer interest in high-value mobile services. In one recent deployment, through the use of a virtualized infrastructure, a leading global MVNO was able to design and deploy a low-cost service offering in just three months – an effort they believe would have taken other operators more than a year through traditional legacy approaches.
As the foundation for accelerating these types of services, NFVs are able to dramatically reduce capital investment costs for mobile operators while improving their time to market and increasing added value for their customers.
While all of this may seem daunting, we need to follow the lessons learned from the enterprise. Virtualization makes a lot of sense, and it’s here to stay. Yes, operators face many challenges, but NFV now arms the network to address many of them head on. If operators are open to new ways of thinking – and to new architectures – they can lead their organizations to new levels of growth and profitability. The time is now, however. Don’t wait and see on NFV.
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