Huawei Unveils Innovative Carrier SDN Prototype Series

Huawei, a leading global information and communications technology (ICT) solutions provider, unveiled its Carrier SDN, an end-to-end software defined networking (SDN) architecture for carrier networks, at the recent SDN & OpenFlow World Congress. At the event, Huawei demonstrated several Carrier SDN prototypes, including a generic SDN controller for hybrid SDN networking, an optical line terminal (OLT) containing an SDN controller, a broadband network gateway (BNG) based on SDN architecture, and an SDN controller for transport networks. Huawei also demonstrated the application of Carrier SDN technology in access networks, metro networks, transport networks, and data centers.

According to a keynote address ("End to End SDN: Carrier and Data Center Networks") delivered at the event by Dr. Justin Joubine Dustzadeh, Huawei Technologies, CTO & VP Technology Strategy, Networks, SDN technology has been deployed primarily for inter-data center networks. Huawei has taken the lead in proposing Carrier SDN architecture, a broader approach to SDN that extends its application to end-to-end carrier networks.

"Software-defined networking will enable operators to become more competitive by offering truly differentiating services. It will also help optimize the use of network resources while reducing operational costs. This can be achieved through the separation of the control plane from the data plane via standardized interfaces and the use of a programmatic control plane with open APIs for 3rd-party application development and integration with operations support systems (OSS). This vision can be further enhanced through the orchestration between centralized controllers in different network domains and the virtualization of various network functions leveraging the IT industry’s latest innovations." said Dr. Dustzadeh.

Given the company's extensive experience in working with network operators, Huawei believes that SDN will bring a unique value in each network domain. In the access domain, for example, SDN will help operators simplify the management of a large number of remote nodes. With the BNG, SDN will provide an open and scalable 3rd-party application development environment to increase the agility of creating new value-added services. For transport networks, SDN will enable more flexible and fine-grained provisioning and control of bandwidth resources. This flexibility will allow operators to provide Optical-as-a-Service offerings with user-defined and application-specific QoS at different levels of service agreements.

In the data center network, SDN will provide an on-demand and virtual network which meets the customer’s changing needs including the deployment of new services. SDN will also help with the management of interconnections within, and between, data centers.

"With an end-to-end software-defined networking architecture, operators will be able to build an elastic network for the agile delivery of value-added services," said, Dr. Dustzadeh.

Dr. Dustzadeh also announced Huawei’s successful participation in the interoperability testing this month at the ONF Plugfest, using their OpenFlow 1.2 controller and switch, in addition to some of Huawei’s SDN ecosystem partnerships at the opening of an SDN Lab in Silicon Valley (Santa Clara, CA).

Huawei has been playing an active role in the international effort to standardize SDN, cooperating with operators, research institutes, and other equipment vendors to enhance the technological maturity of Carrier SDN and make it ready for live networks.