According to a new report from ABI Research, the evolution toward “4G” networks with flat, distributed architectures has significant market implications as wireless operators seek to improve performance by changing the foundation of how their networks are designed.
Traditionally, the approach to mobile networks has been based on a hierarchical and centralized core network, ABI said, but data management is being pushed to the network edge in next-generation networks in order to improve performance, due to the greater demands of data traffic in 3G and particularly “4G.” ABI called the movement away from a centralized data center to a distributed architecture a “data center without walls,” and said it has opened up opportunities for deep packet inspection and optimization companies such as Allot and Sandvine, which provide specialized hardware that inspects and manages data streams.
“If it were not for performance needs, no operator would deploy a distributed network,” says Joe Hoffman, ABI Research principal analyst. “But since the market demands that performance, virtualized and distributed networks deliver and afford additional degrees of integration. Local and regional data centers will be populated with one or very few platforms, giving an edge to the virtualized SGW/PGW vendor.”
However, ABI said, major infrastructure vendors are responding to the market by boosting the performance of inspection and optimization functions in their network PDN gateways, or PGWs. Because a local or regional data center only handles a fraction of the overall data in a distributed network, so less computing power is required and an integrated PGW solution – or alternatives from vendors such as ByteMobile, which was acquired last year by Citrix – are becoming more feasible and competitive, according to the analyst firm.
ABI reported that “there are great implications for the DPI, optimization and policy industry” as virtualization moves into the core network and policy, DPI and optimization are based in local or regional data centers.
