Continuous Innovation in IP Domain, Boost Carrier's New Growth

PARIS, April 20, 2023 /PRNewswire/ -- During the 2023 MPLS SD & AI Net World Congress, Huawei's technology summit themed "Continuous Innovation in IP Domain, Boost New Growth" was successfully held at the Paris Exhibition Center in Paris. This summit discussed the target network architecture, protocol evolution, and automation technologies in the hope of helping carriers build converged IP networks to improve efficiency and introduced digital managed network solutions and architecture, which are intended to help carriers transform from ISPs to MSPs and drive new growth of B2B services. 

According to the industry development trend, Omdia senior analyst Sameer Malik pointed out that with the large-scale deployment of 5G and gigabit home broadband around the world and the acceleration of industry digital transformation, carriers' IP transport networks need to not only increase bandwidth, but also provide intelligent connections to transport multiple services with differentiated SLA assurance. This, together with network advantages, will allow carriers to expand B2B services.

In terms of the network architecture, Gu Rui, Vice President of Huawei Data Communication Product Line, elaborated on the future-oriented IP target network architecture. He explained that this architecture features ultra-broadband, full service transport, high automation, one-stop services, and green design. Technologies such as Wi-Fi 7, 800GE, and orthogonal architecture help build ultra-broadband infrastructure networks to meet requirements for ultimate user experience. An all-in-one hardware platform and network slicing meet the requirements of converged transport and provide differentiated SLA assurance. High automation is enabled based on SRv6 and network digital map. It provides one-stop services for B2B customers based on carriers' IP private lines with digital managed network. In addition, energy-saving and emission-reduction innovations at the equipment, network, and operational levels help build green IP networks and guarantee sustainable network development.

In terms of protocol evolution, Huawei's Chief IP Protocol Expert Robin Li said SRv6 is one of the best protocols for IP network evolution. SRv6 standards and technologies are becoming increasingly mature. More than 160 networks have been deployed with SRv6 globally, and deployments are ramping up. Carsten Rossenhövel, co-founder and CTO of the European Advanced Networking Test Center (EANTC), introduced the results of the SRv6 multi-vendor interoperability test in 2023. A total of eight mainstream vendors participated in the test, including Huawei. SRv6 test cases cover all scenarios, including basic routing protocols, SRv6 Policy, header compression, reliability, and OAM. In the past six years, more and more vendors have participated in SRv6 interoperability tests, and application scenarios have been fully verified.

In terms of automation, IETF Internet Architecture Board member Wu Qin said that the era of autonomous networks (ANs) has come. AN technologies are developing toward network programmability and openness, service definition-implementation decoupling, network digitalization, intelligent management, and other key directions. Telemetry-based network digital map provides network visualization from dimensions such as infrastructure, networks, slices, routes, services, and applications. It also enables configuration intent simulation verification and traffic optimization. This helps carriers better manage physical networks with digital capabilities.

For carriers' B2B services, Wen Huizhi, Chief Solution Architect of Huawei Data Communication Production Line, shed light on the architecture design and solutions for digital managed network services. Carriers need to design in five domains, including physical networks, user networks, O&M, security, and services, and provide NaaS capabilities to meet differentiated assurance, cross-domain collaboration, all-scenario protection, and tenant-level O&M requirements.

Finally, Zuo Meng, Vice President of Huawei's Data Communications Product Line, said Huawei is ready to work with carriers and industry partners to promote the evolution of target IP networks, build better converged ultra-broadband IP networks, explore new scenarios, services, and business models, and accelerate industry digital transformation, thereby helping customers achieve business success and drive new growth.