Softwarization of telecommunications
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Antonio Manzalini
Antonio Manzalini received the M. Sc. Degree in Electronic Engineering from the Politecnico of Turin. In '90 he joined CSELT, where he has been working on transport networks. He has been active in several European Projects and Standardization Bodies, taking leading roles in the areas of networks and service platforms. His results have been published in more than 100 papers. He is Chair of the IEEE Initiative on Software Defined Networks. He is Senior Manager at the Strategy and Innovation Department of Telecom Italia.
Telecom Italia, Strategy and Innovation – Future Centre, Via Reiss Romoli, 274 Torino, Italy
Abstract
This paper argues that SDN and NFV principles are going to impact not only the evolution of current networks, but also the services and applications platforms. In fact, SDN and NFV, together with Cloud and Edge Computing, can be seen as facets of a broader systemic innovation wave (called softwarization) which is transforming the overall telecommunications and ICT ecosystems. Specifically, the paper proposes the vision of Software Defined Infrastructures (SDI) as highly dynamic and pervasive telecommunications and ICT frameworks of logical resources capable of executing (with a trade-off of centralisation and distribution) any network and service functions. Eventually, it is argued that, in this evolution towards SDI, the border between the networks and the Cloud-Edge Computing platforms will gradually disappear. On the other side, also the distinction between the networks and the future “terminals” (e. g., including machines, smart things, drones, robot) will blur. This transformation will have profound techno-economic implications for the telecommunications and ICT ecosystems, paving the way to the Digital Society and the Digital Economy.
About the author
Antonio Manzalini received the M. Sc. Degree in Electronic Engineering from the Politecnico of Turin. In '90 he joined CSELT, where he has been working on transport networks. He has been active in several European Projects and Standardization Bodies, taking leading roles in the areas of networks and service platforms. His results have been published in more than 100 papers. He is Chair of the IEEE Initiative on Software Defined Networks. He is Senior Manager at the Strategy and Innovation Department of Telecom Italia.
Telecom Italia, Strategy and Innovation – Future Centre, Via Reiss Romoli, 274 Torino, Italy
©2015 Walter de Gruyter Berlin/Boston
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Software defined networking and network function virtualization
- Special Issue
- Can open-source projects (re-)shape the SDN/NFV-driven telecommunication market?
- Softwarization of carrier networks
- Virtualization of residential customer premise equipment. Lessons learned in Brazil vCPE trial
- Toward flexible optical networks with Transport-SDN
- SDN and NFV in the mobile core: Approaches and challenges
- Prototyping new concepts beyond 4G – The Fraunhofer Open5GCore
- Softwarization of telecommunications
- Distinguished Dissertations
- The real-time rendering of subdivision surfaces using hardware tessellation
Articles in the same Issue
- Frontmatter
- Editorial
- Software defined networking and network function virtualization
- Special Issue
- Can open-source projects (re-)shape the SDN/NFV-driven telecommunication market?
- Softwarization of carrier networks
- Virtualization of residential customer premise equipment. Lessons learned in Brazil vCPE trial
- Toward flexible optical networks with Transport-SDN
- SDN and NFV in the mobile core: Approaches and challenges
- Prototyping new concepts beyond 4G – The Fraunhofer Open5GCore
- Softwarization of telecommunications
- Distinguished Dissertations
- The real-time rendering of subdivision surfaces using hardware tessellation
