TCW 2020 011-012 P1 Cover Telecom Infrastructure
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Unmatched Global Market Coverage Telecom IT - HPC - A.I. - IoT Infrastructures - Networks - Edge - RAN Cloud - Data Centers - Storage Telecom COTS World Video Networks - Broadcast - Digital TV Broadband Broadcast IoT AI Convergence From Chips to Rack Scale Systems Telecom COTS World is a Global Publication of e2mos Nov-Dec 2020 5G Automation and Intelligent Edge, Autonomous Networks, Service Assurance & AI Massive network automation might be years away, but there’s plenty of scope now Headlines Telecom Infrastructures & Video Networks • Mavenir Acquires Small Cells Vendor ip.access • World Markets for Communications Network Infrastructure 2020 Technology Spending Across Telecommunications, Webscale and Carrier Neutral for 150 Network Operators « REPORT » • Haivision Video Streaming and Networking Solution Provider Celebrates Important Company Milestone with its Initial Public Offering • Intelligent Application & Service Monitoring, Q2 2019 “The Forrester Wave” The 13 Providers That Matter Most and How They Stack Up • HPE to move headquarters to the Houston metro Deeper in the heart of Texas • Guide to Ethernet Storage Fabrics, FREE eBook from NVIDIA/Mellanox • Independent market research and competitive analysis of next-generation business and technology solutions for service providers and vendors A Case Study from HEAVY READING for Cisco & Cox Communications • The 2020 Streaming Media 50 with HQ in North America The 50 Companies That Matter Most in Online Video Last Minute CES 2021 André Kudelski Tapped to Share Expertise & Insights for Two Variety Entertainment Summit Sessions at CES 2021 taking place virtually on January 14 Products & Technology from Chips to Application-ready Platforms Headlines in this Edition Cover Story • 5G Automation and Intelligent Edge, Autonomous Dear Reader, Networks, Service Assurance & AI Here is your Free Copy of: Massive network automation might be years away, but Telecom COTS World One of our there's plenty of scope now Six Global High-Tech e-magazines from Chips to Rack Scale Hi-end Computers & Software Headlines Six e-magazines at your choice keeping you up-to-date by • Mavenir Acquires Small Cells Vendor ip.access Product / Market Segment. • World Markets for Communications Network More Focus in Less Time Infrastructure Hardware, Software & Services 2020: Each of the 6 e-magazine has its Technology Spending Across Telecommunications, Dedicated Website, you can trace Webscale and Carrier Neutral for 150 Network Operators immediately each Edition published at least in the last 2 years and you « REPORT » can jump from one site to another with one click. • Haivision Celebrates Important Company Milestone with • Selected Original Sources its Initial Public Offering and Debut on Toronto Stock • Adapted to Reader’s Preferences Exchange • Many Direct Links included Video Streaming and Networking Solution Provider s Click on the Logos completes IPO and Trades on TSX with Symbol HAI TIP: put one or more e-magazine • Intelligent Application & Service Monitoring, Q2 2019 Links in your calendar with a recurrence of one month or at your “The Forrester Wave” choice. Take a look before meetings The 13 Providers That Matter Most & How They Stack Up Semi Update World • HPE to move headquarters to the Houston metro Semiconductors - Sensors - Tools - Cooling Deeper in the heart of Texas • Guide to Ethernet Storage Fabrics, FREE eBook from aiworld NVIDIA/Mellanox IoT World • Independent market research and competitive analysis of next-generation business and technology solutions for service providers and vendors Embedded Systems World A Case Study from HEAVY READING for Cisco Systems and Cox Communications Telecom COTS World Broadband Broadcast IoT AI Convergence • The 2020 Streaming Media 50 with HQ in North America The 50 Companies That Matter Most in Online Video ATCA World Advanced Telecom Computing Architecture Editor/Publisher: e2mos Last Minute Addition WEB: www.e2mos.com • André Kudelski Tapped to Share Expertise and Insights Contact: [email protected] for Two Variety Entertainment Summit Sessions at CES Management 2021 Daniel Dierickx CEO & Co-founder at e2mos 40 Years Business & Market Expertise in Chips, Embedded Computing & Software Global Customer Relationship Telecom COTS World - Nov-Dec 2020 - Page 2 Massive network automation might be years away, but there's plenty of scope now 5G Automation and Intelligent Edge, Autonomous Networks, Service Assurance & AI By Annie Turner, Contributing Editor, FutureNet World Contributing Editor, Annie Turner asks Steve Jarrett, Global Head of Data and AI at Orange, about the operator's ambitious network automation strategy, timing and progress. He charts the path from the test and learn approach that is being applied today, to the recent transformational tie-up with Google Cloud and a future of “massive network automation”. Orange unveiled its Engage2025 five-year strategic plan in December 2019, which has four main strands. They include gaining a new level in its digital transformation by positioning AI and data at the heart of innovation model. More specifically, to achieve three tightly linked goals of smarter networks, greater operating efficiency and reinventing customer experience. Telcos have been trying to exploit big data for years, with little or mixed success in the main. Jarrett says that artificial intelligence has accelerated progress with this greatly in the last two years, but adds, “We're in this environment where there's lots of new tools, most of which are not very mature and the environments extremely dynamic. That's what led us to the test and learn approach [with AI] because it's just a very dynamic situation.” He stresses that Orange is, “very focused on impact and use cases to help the business” right across the business. He is also keen to emphasise that in no sense is Orange waiting for the 5G non-standalone core to progress. Jarret says, “The vast majority of our investment is in physical infrastructure and will continue to be so. Think about how much it costs to lay fibre and deploy base stations, even if they're virtualised. There is still the power element, the antenna and the compute, however it's structured at the base station, and those towers, not to mention the spectrum.” He says that AI and automation could be applied to them, with the “test and learn approach”, from network planning to predictive maintenance. Early experiments are already saving the company millions of euros as well as improving customer service, from identifying the most profitable base station to preventing truck roll for fibre broadband problems, and saving energy through predicting idle nodes in the RAN. On the starting blocks However, Jarrett thinks that massive network automation, “will be more like a ten-year time horizon, because we're going to have a radical shift in network architectures that we're just beginning to see now. They will begin to function well over the next two to three years, but it'll take a couple more for them to be deployed and then adopted across the world.” He said that if on a scale of one to ten, the massive network automation envisioned in ten years is ten, then Orange's progress stands at two or three now. Jarrett continues, “Even somebody like Rakuten [Mobile I would put them at three to four], on that scale”. This is not dismissive of achievement, but an indication of the “enormous opportunity” the industry has “to transform the way that we run our businesses through automation”. ... to the next page Telecom COTS World - Nov-Dec 2020 - Page 3 Massive network automation might be years away, but there's plenty of scope now 5G Automation and Intelligent Edge, Autonomous Networks, Service Assurance & AI ... from previous page He adds, “If you look at, for example, how Google runs their data centres and how they also run the operations internally at their own company, and their capital efficiency. I think you see a model there for what the opportunity is for all businesses, not just telco.” “As you disaggregate the software from hardware, you have good interfaces to access the data and to act on the data that enables a much more dynamic kind of environment. I think we're going to see an explosion of that. We already see it generally in the containerisation of how services work on cloud providers today in terms of software providers. You see an explosion of ways that enable you to, for example control your costs, or provide security and so on. We're going to see enormous amount of innovation.” Partnership with Google Cloud Little wonder then that in July, Orange and Google Cloud announced a strategic partnership to accelerate the transformation of Orange's IT infrastructure and the development of future cloud services, in particular edge computing. Jarrett says, “A big part of my job is to make sure that we make large partnerships decisions that allow us to improve the advantage of all [that] external investment,” pointing out that the hyperscale cloud companies have been dealing with data problems similar to those of the operators for years, but at much greater scale. Still, while the cloud hyperscalers were created to be data driven, the operators were not, hence the travails of digital transformation. Jarrett is nothing daunted, comparing the situation to the early years of the internet when the pace of change was extraordinary, and companies had fundamentally to rethink how their business would operate. He says, “We need to think about data as being a common wealth, which is the ability to share data between teams and break down the silos. It enables everyone to take business benefit from using the data for different purposes. Historically, the team that generated a particular data set felt like they owned it but, for example, network data is…extremely useful to many different teams. That's the biggest, the hardest, problem plus the willingness to change and that also relates to training and skills.” As part of Engage2025, Orange is committed to invest more than €1.5 billion in a skills-building programme open to all employees, that will train 20,000 staff in network virtualisation, AI, data, cloud computing, code and cybersecurity.