virtualization and bss transformation - why and how

Webinar: Virtualization & BSS Transformation – Why and How Corine Suscens, Senior Marketing Manager, Openet

Sean Broderick, Product Marketing Manager, Openet

18 September 2014

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• BSS virtualization: Key drivers and benefits (Corine)

• Operator examples

• Virtualizing BSS whilst reducing risks and protecting legacy investment (Sean)

• Case studies

Agenda

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BSS virtualization: Key drivers and benefitsCorine Suscens, Senior Marketing Manager, Openet

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• Operators will be “using virtualization to drive innovative service creation, especially the creation of services and apps that require time to market intervals of only days, even hours.”

• “Many operators view NFV as a key ingredient in their OSS/BSS transformation objectives, offering an escape from the legacy 12-24 month service creation cycles that handicap their long-term competitiveness”

Source: 2014 OSS/BSS Investment Trends: Top Operator Drivers and Priorities, Current Analysis

Business Drivers for BSS Virtualization

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• Virtualization: create a virtual version of a computing resource

• Removes one-to-one dependency of BSS software on specific hardware

• Easier creation, scaling and management of instances of BSS solutions

• NFV (Network Functions Virtualization): initiative by operators (2012) • Virtualization technology

• Consolidate network equipment onto industry standard high volume hardware

• Network functions in software

• Extending virtualization/NFV to BSS

• Accelerate service innovation

• Learn fast and minimize risk

• Facilitate new business models

• Optimize costs

Key Benefits of BSS Virtualization

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• Virtualization: Simplifies and accelerate service deployment process

• Easier to deploy and manage software/BSS

• No need to create a full new hardware based environment for each service introduction, with full procure-design-integrate-test-deploy cycle

• No separate test environment

• Test and launch on the same infrastructure

• Test to scale production reduced from weeks to hours

• Services can be rapidly scaled up or down

• Rapidly deploy targeted services based on geography or customer sets

Benefit 1: Accelerate Service Innovation

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• A tier one North American mobile operator :

• Introduce services in days vs months without virtualization.

• Time to roll out additional capacity from days to hours (policy-based use cases)

• Telefonica’s UNICA virtualization infrastructure

• Deployment times from about 4 months to 4 days

Accelerate Service Innovation: Operator Examples

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• Test new services with minimum risk/disruption (73.4% operators)

• Easy to roll out or roll back services

• Resources can easily be re-allocated

• Easy to go from small scale trial to full scale production

• In-service upgrades and modifications: faster, minimum disruption

• Adoption of open standards with BSS software and NFV

• Removes vendor lock-in and reduce needs for vendor specific skills

• Simplifies integration of new components to the existing network

Benefit 2: Learn Fast and Minimize Risks

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• Various BSS solutions can be deployed on a common platform

• Easy to create tailored solutions for specific market segments

• Open up BSS to 3rd parties (via APIs) => Multi-sided business models

• Partners can directly build, launch, maintain own offers

• E.g. MVNOs, OTTs, content partners, enterprise customers, IoT providers

Benefit 3: Facilitate New Business Models

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• Reduce hardware costs

• Consolidate hardware

• Standard hardware instead of proprietary

• Simplified, faster deployment process

• Optimize hardware utilization

• Multiple applications can co-exist on the same physical server

• Hardware does no longer need to be permanently dedicated to a specific application or purpose

• Hardware only needed for occasional peak load can be re-allocated during off peak periods

Benefit 4: Optimize Costs (Opex &Capex)

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Virtualizing BSS whilst reducing risks and protecting legacy investment

Sean Broderick, Product Marketing Manager, Openet

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• Rigid mobile operator processes beget rigid BSS systems

• Agility needs to be more than a buzzword to enable new business models

• Single supplier strategies ≠ Agility

• Mobile operators persist with NEM’s in spite of a lack of domain expertise that a specialist BSS vendor can bring

Single Supplier Strategies Shrinking

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Protect Legacy BSS Investment• Mobile operators want to protect

legacy BSS investments made over many years

• Operators want to squeeze the last drop of ROI out of legacy BSS investments

• This approach can be to the detriment of project timelines and stymie real innovation

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• Why would an operator do this?

• Reduce time to market as services down to a matter of weeks

• Introduce new services such as RCS without legacy systems acting as a bottleneck

• Protect Legacy BSS investment while having the flexibility to scale up as required.

• Where appropriate adjunct systems can interface to existing BSS

Virtualized & Non-Virtualized BSS side by side?

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BSS Transformation and Virtualization

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Technical Benefits of a Virtualization approach

Easier to manage systems

Linearly scalable to large TPS rates with low latencies

Rapid deployment and upgrade times

• Central management of all running virtual machines.

• Simplifying configuration, monitoring applications and enabling system recovery

• Architected to handle large volumes transactions per second

• Spread across multiple data centres

• Deployment in hours rather than days or weeks

• The same principle applies to upgrades.

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In September 2013, AT&T launched the next generation of its Supplier Domain Program – Domain 2.0 –triggering a swift and broad move to a modern, cloud-based architecture.

AT&T plans to simplify and scale its network by:

• Separating hardware and software functionality;

• Separating network control plane and forwarding planes; and

• Improving management of functionality in the software layer.

Virtualization in action: AT&T’s Domain 2.0

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Openet Large Scale Virtualized Policy Deployment

• Flexible PCC : 2G, 3G, 4G LTE

• Over 100M mobile subscribers.

• Strong data ARPU growth

• Systems used: Openet Policy Manager, Convergent Charging, Balance Manager, Mediation

• Includes World’s First Virtualized Policy Solution

• Sample use cases supported:• Tiered data pricing and control – e.g. speed

tiers

• Fair usage enforcement, bill shock notification

• Dynamic services: Parental/usage controls -

Data and SMS (with real-time limit / usage notifications), Service passes

• Mediation for voice and data services

• Pre-paid Data and Messaging Charging Control

• LTE Application Policy – Video Calling and

VoLTE

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• Virtualization enables operators to keep pace with the growth of mobile data

• Deployments are handling large transaction volumes necessary

• Network updates and maintenance requirements can now be executed without impacting subscriber experiences

• Future proofing by being compliant with network functions virtualization (NFV)

• Cost effective from large scale deployments down to Tier 3 operators.

Virtualized Policy – Benefits Delivered

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• BSS virtualization is a key enabler for innovation and will provide operators with the agility and flexibility to quickly capitalise on new revenue generating opportunities.

• While adopting NFV is crucial, deploying the technology in isolation is not enough. Operators must work with BSS specialists that have experience of deploying innovative solutions that fully realize the many advantages of this revolutionary network architecture

Summing Up

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Thank you!Any questions please submit to info@openet.com

www.openet.com/virtualization