The Open Multi-Vendor NFV Showcase is an effort to increase adoption of horizontal Network Function Virtualization based on its original principles of “leveraging standard IT virtualisation technology to consolidate many network equipment types onto industry standard high volume servers, switches and storage”
Today, open source MANO components like OpenStack and OSM, high-performance NFVI, increasingly relevant standards from ETSI NFV ISG and the evolution of VNFs to cloud-native technologies, can jointly achieve running fully virtualized, multi-vendor Network Services in highly demanding production environments.
NFV promises a new ecosystem, orchestrating multi-vendor VNFs, on top of commoditized infrastructure (based on COTS servers, white box networking and Open Source), with reduced risks for vendor lock-in, and more opportunities for new vendors. However, carriers are still adopting single-vendor, monolithic, virtualized solutions (“vertical NFV environments”), neglecting the NFV real advantages.
This showcase is useful for increasing the adoption of NFV based on Open and commodity technologies, because it demonstrates how a number of leading VNF vendors, on top of commoditized x86 infrastructure, managed by well-known, production-ready, open-source components like OpenStack and Open Source MANO, and integrated through an standards-based architecture, can make virtualized multi-vendor networks possible.
The effort, coordinated by Whitestack, supported by ETSI NFV Plugtests Programme, Intel Inc., the OpenStack Foundation and VNF vendors, demonstrates carriers how they can benefit from an horizontal NFV platform, in opposition to monolithic solutions from a single, traditional vendor.
The results of this experience, will be published during our Talk Demonstrating NFV is possible: 1st Open Multi-Vendor NFV Showcase in the Open Infraestructure Summit, Denver, CO, April 29-May 1st 2019. Do not miss it!
