ONF and ETSI Collaborate on SDN + NFV

The European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) and the Open Networking Foundation (ONF) announced a strategic partnership agreement to further the development of Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) specifications.  A formal agreement was approved at this week's ETSI General Assembly meeting in Mandelieu-la-Napoule, France.

ETSI and ONF have maintained a strong working relationship since ETSI’s unveiling of the NFV Industry Specification Group (ISG) in 2012. The NFV architecture is supported by SDN and benefits from ONF’s work with the OpenFlow protocol. Together, the organizations will explore how SDN can enable forwarding-plane support for some of the most important NFV use cases. In particular, our two organizations will collaborate on the means to build dynamic, programmable Virtualized Network Function (VNF) forwarding graphs. ETSI’s NFV ISG has launched a call for NFV Proofs of Concept (PoC) and published a PoC framework. ETSI is now keen to see PoCs that employ both NFV and SDN and showcase the benefits of both technologies.

"ETSI is focused on addressing the problems that telecommunications networks face today by evolving standard IT virtualization technology to consolidate many network equipment types onto industry standard high volume servers, switches and storage," said Luis Jorge Romero, director-general of ETSI. "This collaboration with ONF allows us to both significantly contribute to the goals of the NFV ISG, and serve as a relevant source for requirements and use cases for the SDN community."

In addition, ONF released an "OpenFlow-enabled SDN and NFV" solution brief that discusses the network challenges that operators will need to overcome to implement NFV, and presents use cases that demonstrate how OpenFlow-enabled SDN can meet the need for automated, open, and programmable network connectivity to support NFV. The NFV solution brief will provide insight into how OpenFlow-enabled SDN can accelerate NFV deployments by offering a scalable, elastic, and on-demand architecture well suited to the dynamic NFV communications requirements for both virtual and physical networking infrastructures.

https://www.opennetworking.org/images/stories/downloads/sdn-resources/solution-briefs/sb-sdn-nvf-solution.pdf
http://www.etsi.org/news-events/news/764-2014-03-onf-and-etsi-announce-strategic-collaboration-for-sdn-support-of-nfv

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Cloudera Raises $160 Million for Enterprise Apache Hadoop

Cloudera, a start-up based in Palo Alto, California, announced $160 million in new venture funding support its Apache Hadoop-based data management software and services. The new funding round was led by T. Rowe Price, along with three other top-tier public market investors, and included an investment by Google Ventures and an affiliate of MSD Capital, L.P., the private investment firm for Michael S. Dell and his family. To date, Cloudera has raised $300 million in venture funding.

Cloudera said it will use the funding to further drive the enterprise adoption of and innovation in Hadoop and promote the enterprise data hub (EDH) market; support geographic expansion into Europe and Asia; expand its services and support capabilities; and scale the field and engineering organizations.

"Cloudera is successfully helping enterprises exploit 'big data' and manage the transition to becoming more data centric," said Henry Ellenbogen, Portfolio Manager, T. Rowe Price New Horizons Fund. "With strong leadership, an ability to innovate, a satisfied customer base, and a large partner community, we believe Cloudera is well positioned to build a durable and leading company in this space."

"We see broad demand from enterprises who want a flexible approach to handling large amounts of data, and we expect this market to continue to grow rapidly," said Google Ventures General Partner Karim Faris. "Cloudera is dramatically lowering the cost of reliable storage for the enterprise and is enabling the analysis and mining of large data sets in a way that wasn't possible before."

Recently, Cloudera brought to market the industry's first complete enterprise data hub.  The company said the key advantages for enterprise customers are:

• Frees them from being dependent on expensive, specialized data storage and compute systems, and instead take advantage of the power of industry-standard server hardware and scale-out architecture;
• Enables enterprises to store any amount of data, of any type, and keep it online as long as needed;
• Ensures that data is secure and governed to meet enterprise requirements;
• Makes it possible for customers to "bring compute to the data," to build a single unified data system rather than moving data around from one system to another;
• Lets customers offload selected data and workloads from expensive, specialized data warehouse infrastructure to alleviate the pain of missed SLAs and degraded query performance;
• Can accommodate huge and varied data sets for more meaningful and timely analytics and enable innovative security solutions, such as real-time anomaly detection without duplicating data or building custom, specialized solutions.

http://www.cloudera.com

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Vertical Systems: 2013 U.S. Cable MSO Ethernet LEADERBOARD

Time Warner Cable leads among cable MSOs in the U.S. market in terms of delivering Ethernet services, according to Vertical Systems Group’s latest research.  The next five cable MSOs on the 2013 U.S. Cable MSO Ethernet LEADERBOARD are as follows (in rank order based on port share): Cox, Comcast, Charter Business, Lightpath (formerly Optimum Lightpath) and Bright House Networks.

“Cable MSOs headlined the Carrier Ethernet market in 2013 with meteoric growth. Operators across all service territories successfully competed with Incumbents and CLECs on the basis of price and rapid provisioning.” said Rick Malone, principal at Vertical Systems Group. “Within the Cable MSO segment, Time Warner Cable and Cox led in port share, while Comcast led in growth. Overall, cable operators were particularly competitive selling metro Ethernet LAN services and Ethernet Internet access.”

Vertical Systems Group’s LEADERBOARDs measures Ethernet Service Provider market presence based on billable retail port installations. Share results are calculated at year-end and mid-year for the U.S. and Global Provider markets. Year-end results additionally include U.S. provider share analysis for three separate segments: Incumbent Carrier, Competitive Provider, and Cable MSO. Research sources for share calculations include Vertical’s base of enterprise installations, plus direct input and other data from our bi-annual surveys of Ethernet providers throughout the world.

http://www.verticalsystems.com/vsglb/2013-u-s-cable-mso-carrier-ethernet-leaderboard/

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Taiwan Mobile Picks NSN for LTE-Advanced

Taiwan Mobile has selected NSN for a rapid roll-out of its multi-band LTE-Advanced network.  The deployment will use NSN’s Liquid Radio and Liquid Core technology, along with LTE-Ad carrier aggregation technology to increase bandwidth and network performance by combining the 700 MHz and 1800 MHz spectrum bands.

Specifically, NSN will implement its high-capacity Flexi Multiradio 10 Base Stations, Evolved Packet Core technology and NetAct network management system. The agreement covers also network planning and optimization services. Financial terms were not disclosed.

"We have a successful history of collaboration with Taiwan Mobile, which started in early 1997 with the launch of the operator’s GSM network. NSN is now the sole supplier of Taiwan Mobile’s 2G, 3G and 4G networks,” said Markus Borchert, President of NSN Greater China region. “With our innovative Carrier Aggregation solution and network planning and optimization services, the operator can combine its spectrum for significantly increased data throughput and an unmatched customer experience.”

http://nsn.com/news-events/press-room/press-releases/taiwan-mobile-selects-nsn-as-sole-supplier-for-its-lte-advanced-network

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ChinaCache to Integrate Caching in LTE Base Stations with NSN

ChinaCache is working with Nokia Solutions and Networks to incorporate content delivery network (CDN) technologies into NSN’s Liquid Applications solution, enabling content to be delivered directly from the LTE base station for greater performance.

The companies said the intent of the collaboration is to further enhance Liquid Applications and strengthen ChinaCache’s capabilities in mobile Internet content delivery. Liquid Applications will enable innovative features for ChinaCache’s current technology, such as improved location capabilities, awareness of user behavior, and real-time adaptation to network conditions.

“Liquid Applications is a disruptive innovation that will enable mobile operators to truly differentiate the mobile broadband experience for their subscribers through accelerated content delivery and exciting new applications and services,” said Markus Borchert, president of NSN Greater China region. “Cooperating with ChinaCache on the next generation of mobile CDN technology will open up the opportunity for unprecedented subscriber experience while allowing mobile operators to introduce new business models.”

http://www.nsn.com
http://www.chinacache.com/

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Padmasree Warrior Joins Box's Board

Padmasree Warrior, Chief Technology and Strategy Officer for Cisco, has joined the board of directors of Bos.

“Padma is an extraordinary leader with deep insights into global technology trends and a wealth of experience leading innovative, world-class organizations,” said Aaron Levie, co-founder and CEO, Box. “We are in the midst of a once-in-a-generation shift to a world defined by cloud and mobile computing. Padma will be a great resource for both Box and our customers as we navigate this transition.”

“The cloud and mobile devices are dramatically changing how people use and share their content, and Box is at the forefront of building both an innovative product and an enterprise platform that can define this new era of work,” said Padmasree Warrior. “I’m thrilled to be joining the Box board and to be a part of a team and company with such potential.”

http://www.box.com

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Dell'Oro: Shifts in the Evolved Packet Core Market

The overall Wireless Packet Core market grew two percent during the fourth quarter of 2013 versus the year-ago period, according to a new report from Dell'Oro Group.  The higher growth portion of the market that is used to manage LTE wireless networks, called Evolved Packet Core (EPC), experienced significantly higher growth than the total market.

"This year, 2014, will see significant shifts in the packet core market," explained Chris DePuy, Vice President of Wireless Packet Core Research at Dell'Oro Group. "The introduction of NFV systems and new LTE projects emerging outside of US, Korea and Japan will offer both challenges and opportunities for the wireless packet core market."

Some highlights:

• North American growth slowed significantly.  Asia-Pacific growth, specifically, China, is expected to contribute significantly to growth in 2014.  Vendors with significant exposure to Chinese EPC contracts include Alcatel-Lucent, Ericsson, Huawei, NSN, ZTE, and others.
• Network Functions Virtualization (NFV), is now available from many vendors.  This is a software-only version of packet core products that can be run on computer servers.  Its use represents a significant departure from traditional bundled software and hardware deployments.
• Average price per license dropped noticeably in the fourth quarter versus the third quarter, as vendors offered new licensing terms to service providers.
• Installed base of MME licenses as a percentage of total mobile subscribers in North America is ten times greater than each of the other three major regions.

http://www.DellOro.com

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Open Data Center Alliance Plans Fall Conference in SF

The Open Data Center Alliance (ODCA) will host its annual, flagship "Forecast" conference from September 22-24 in San Francisco.

The following underwriters are aboard: Intel (underwriting sponsor), HP (platinum sponsor), Verne Global (gold sponsor), Appnomic Systems (silver sponsor) and CohesiveFT (lanyard sponsor). In addition, the Cloud Security Alliance (CSA), the Cloud Credential Council (CCC), Organization for the Advancement of Structured Information Standards (OASIS), and TM Forum will join Forecast as collaborative sponsors.

The mission of the ODCA is to advance the deployment of enterprise cloud solutions and services that are interoperable, secure and free of vendor lock-in.

http://www.opendatacenteralliance.org/forecast2014

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