We hear a lot about network functions virtualization and software-defined networking these days, and a handful of communications service providers have already launched business-focused self-provisioning capabilities leveraging these technologies. But the fact remains that there are still a lot of unanswered questions and foggy terms related to NFV and SDN. The TM Forum, an industry association that focuses on CSP back office issues related to billing and operational support systems, is among the entities working to bring clarity and interoperability to these new terms and technologies.

NFVZone recently spoke with Ken Dilbeck, vice president of collaboration and R&D at TM Forum, to discuss all of the above. TM Forum’s members are keenly interested in NFV related to service optimization and how SDN can be one of the implementation technologies to enable that, he said.  

The group is working on various fronts to move NFV and SDN forward. That work includes various Catalyst projects; the publication of its Procurement Survival Guide, which offers up advice on how to buy virtual network functions, given procurement for software-only solutions is a whole new ballgame; and the launch of the ZOOM program, which stands for zero-touch operations, administration, and maintenance, and involves the publication by TMF of various best practice and information guides on challenges of OSS transformation in the new age of automation and virtualization.

Catalyst is TMF’s term for proof-of-concept efforts. At the recent TM Forum Live! in Nice, France, there were various NFV- and SDN-related demonstrations.

One focused on how to instantiate, monitor, and scale virtualized network functions based on such parameters as quality of service and service level agreements and business metrics like cost of power. Companies involved in that one included Aria Networks, AT&T, Ericsson, JDSU, Microsoft, and NTT.

A different Catalyst effort addressed the impact and value of dynamic security orchestration in an NFV environment. It involved AT&T, Bell Canada, Birmingham City University, BT, DT, NetCracker, and Orange.

Another Catalyst project demonstrated the automated setup, configuration, and management of white-box customer premises equipment to support residential IP services without the need for manual installation or specialized equipment. The participants in that effort were AT&T, Orange, and Telecom Italia, along with vendors Alcatel-Lucent, Amdocs, Cisco, Ericsson, Infosys, JDSU, and Juniper.

There were also Catalyst projects called Dynamic APIs for the Connected Carrier; Zero-tech Network-as-a-Service: Agile, Assured and Orchestrated with NFV; Multi-Cloud SDN-NFV Service Orchestration; Closing the Loop Customer Experience, Policy and Virtualization; and Service Network Transformation based on NFV.

While the term orchestration turned up in the titles and descriptions of many of the above-listed Catalyst titles and descriptions, Dilbeck concedes that orchestration is a term for which there is still no precise definition. However, he did say that orchestration goes beyond business process automation to apply the concept of policy management to how services are configured and at what order services can interact. For example, he said, it can accept the requirement to increase available bandwidth on Thursdays, and then put into motion the set of processes that have to take place within the network to make that happen.

While orchestration has been part of networking in the past, Dilbeck says what’s new is the ability to automate it. And that is not necessarily a function of NFV or SDN specifically, he said, but rather due to the fact we now have the compute power to affordably do complex decision-making and orchestration. Virtualization, he added, means we can now use affordable standards-based hardware to support that, and can use it to move around loads to enable that.

If you’re wondering how and where this new brand of orchestration is expected to make its mark relative to carrier networks and their existing OSS and BSS solutions, you’re not alone. Dilbeck suggests that there might not be a specific orchestration engine, but instead that orchestration is being built into OSS and BSS solutions, and that encapsulation can enable some of that capability and allow communications between legacy and new technologies within carrier networks.

In fact, solutions that will enable different parts of the network to talk to each other will be required on a number of fronts. For example, Dilbeck notes that there is no standard language for orchestration at the moment, so TMF is developing an umbrella model that allows different implementation models to speak to one another.

Interestingly, NFV and SDN is not just changing the requirements for carrier OSS and BSS systems, but also the very constructs of such solutions. While these back office systems have traditionally existed as unique systems within the telecommunications infrastructure, in the new world, the OSS or BSS will become just another virtualized resource within the IT infrastructure, said Dilbeck. Following network transformation, he adds, OSS and BSS will be realized in containers and will be loads that are moved around the cloud infrastructure as needed.

“It is a change in the way you think about management and the way you approach it,” he added. “It’s not a siloed thing that exists over here and is special. I think it has implications in how you architect your OSS BSS systems. You’ll have more flexibility as you go forward; these solutions will be less stacks and more modular.”

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