Interdigital: Virtualization – You Know More Than You Realize!

1 © 2014 InterDigital, Inc. All rights reserved.

Alan Carlton, InterDigital Europe, Ltd, May 08, 2014

CW VIRTUAL NETWORKS SIG RADICAL FUTURES, PRAGMATIC BEGINNINGS

invention | collaboration | contribution


Melville, NY (R&D)

Montreal (R&D)

King of Prussia, PA (R&D)

Silicon Valley, CA

(R&D) planned

London, UK (R&D)

San Diego, CA (R&D)

InterDigital Snapshot – Invention, Collaboration, Contribution

Four decades of leading discovery and technology innovation

Widely known for wireless standards but today we are really quite diverse

R&D activities in radio, backhaul networks, video, m2m, IoT, middleware, 5G, and more

200+ engineers and growing between offices in North America and Europe

Opened UK Office in 2013 to drive TSB, H2020, ESA, etc. collaborative initiatives

Wilmington, DE (HQ)


Virtualization – You Know More Than You Realize!

Breaking up of Bell system

in USA

And Today (SDN & NFV) Goals are (10000 ft!)

Separate Control & Data Planes Separate Service Logic From HW (Still no Northbound Interface)

Emergence of Intelligent Networking

(SS7/AIN)

1982 Mid 80’s Mid 90’s+ Mid 00’s-Today

First Wave Of Telco Virtualization The Second Wave The Third & Not The Last?

STEP1 : Separate service logic from Switching HW

RESULT: SUCCESS! Opened up whole new ecosystem

Emergence of Soft Switch Technology

(MGCP)

STEP2: Separate control & data planes (commodity HW!)

RESULT: MIXED! HW not ready, Poor North I/F

Convergence of Telecom & IP

Purpose built HW remains (e.g. MG,SBC)

(MEGACO, SIP)

IP R

ub

ico

n

Networks Will Always Converge To Most Efficient Available Means Of Implementation


NFV 2014 – Virtualization Where We Are Today

Virtualization Layer

Dynamically orchestrated end to end service creation

Endpoints Endpoints

Common Commodity

Platform

OS Layer

General Purpose HW: Compute Storage

Connectivity

VN

F #1

VN

F #1

VN

F #2

VN

F #3

VN

F #3

VN

F #4

VN

F #N

O

RC

HES

TRA

TIO

N

HW abstraction

COTS HW

VNF=Virtual Network Function (aka Service Logic)

Question Answer

What is it Technology that aims to transform the architecture of networks by implementation of network functions in a manner such that they may be instantiated flexibly in various places in the network as required on general purpose equipment. Also along with SDN goal is to open up a whole new application ecosystem, take what AIN did 30 years ago to a next level…

Value Proposition

Reduced CAPEX/OPEX, Energy, TTM, Truck Rolls, Improved flexibility, Faster testing of new Apps, Open market to new software suppliers…

Use Cases (Network Functions)

Switching Elements, Mobile Network Nodes, Virtualized Home, Traffic Analysis, IMS/SBC, AAA/Policy, CDN/Caches, Load Balancers, Security Functions, etc.

Current Status Nearer beginning of hype cycle than end but inevitable for all reasons discussed, ETIS ISG (100+ strong), No standard northbound interface, Endpoints out of scope Orchestration will be key…

Key Enabler


Tomorrow – Next Generation Networks (5G)

Some of the central requirements emerging in the 5G discussion:

• Ultra broadband; 1000x performance improvement on LTE 2010

• Support for the asynchronous behaviour of the 50B IoT Devices

• Extreme low latency (1ms) to support emerging tactile internet

• 90% energy/power reduction on a per functional service basis

• Move to rapid service creation from >90-hours to <90-minutes

And perhaps most importantly a re-architecting of the value chain

• End of network neutrality and rise of the Network as a Service

• OTTs need access to data & operators need to monetize assets ...network status, QoS, E2E service definition, subscriber id, device type, access type…

SDN/NFV will provide the same foundation for both evolving & next gen. networks that SS7/AIN did for previous generations


To Meet Challenge – RAN Will Get Much More Complex

Key emerging technologies: • Increased cell densification (small

cells) to meet future requirements • Introduction of mmW hotspot to

deliver Gbps over limited areas • Smart Spectrum sharing & aggregation (Spectrum virtualization?)

• Advanced D2D scenarios that blur the line between Network and Device

(Device virtualization?)

• Deep, just in time edge caching to support extreme low latency targets

• Self organizing, joint access backhaul, full mesh roadmap finally realized

• And yes a new waveform at some point because simply OFDM does not do a lot of this stuff particularly well

Will Introduce New Challenges & Complexity For NFV Orchestration

Mass deployment of Heterogeneous Small Cells,

emergence of Small Cell Networks

Deployment of super-small cells based on mmWave

technologies

Spectrum Sharing & Aggregation

Self-Organizing Wireless Backhaul

Dynamic Joint Access

Backhaul (Mesh)

Massive MIMO

Deployment

Advanced D2D (Thing-2-Thing) Scenarios e.g.

Distributed MIMO

Deep Edge Caching

Local Traffic Distribution

Local Services


What InterDigital Is Doing In This Space

Network Simulations: Opnet & NS3

Multi-RAT Aggregation

MATLAB, Simulink, Labview, SPW, C/++, Java …

PSD Estimation for Dynamic Spectrum Management

5G Millimeter Wave Cellular

Propagation Modeling (WinProp/AWE & Rune)

Terminal

Base Station

Spectrum Sharing

Platform w/ Sensing

Integrated Platforms for

Testing & Validation

SlimChip IC 6071

mmW Small Cell Mesh Backhaul Development Platform

FPGA / ASIC Design - Xilinx - Altera

- Mentor - Synopsis

Smart Access Manager

Advanced Connectivity Products (IC & Apps)


SPECTRUM PROVIDER: Shared Spectrum Brokering

Database

Applying This Expertise – Network As A Service

• Cloud Server provides Orchestration & Management to enable self-organized operation of heterogeneous Small Cell networks

- Leverages heterogeneous networks (LTE, Wi-Fi) and multiple spectrum bands (licensed, ISM and shared spectrum)

- Uses global and local policies to determine available spectrum and resources

- Assigns channels, powers, etc. to help manage interference

• Leverages crowd-sourced metrics collected from user devices and access points to manage the total network

• Combined with SDN-based virtualization tools enabling efficient control of shared network resources (bandwidth, storage, backhaul) from a remote controller

• Small Cells can be virtualized to support multi-tenancy, i.e. multiple operators sharing pool of Small Cell resources

SELF-ORGANIZING SMALL CELL NETWORK

Allocate Spectrum And Network Resources To Small Cells

Request Resources/Metrics

SMALL CELL ORCHESTRATION & MANAGEMENT

Request/ Receive Spectrum

APPLICATIONS

QoS, Discovery, Analytics

Mid

dle

war

e

Pla

tfo

rm

Services Conduit

Crowd-Sourced Metrics

Small Cell Virtualization

Radio Resource Management SON

Edge Storage

Spectrum Sharing

Cloud Based MW Platform For

RRM/SON & Virtualization


Service Provider A

Service Provider B

Service Provider C

Small Cell Virtualization

Small Cell as a Service

One Interesting Use Case – Small Cell As A Service

• Multi-tenancy enables virtualization and sharing of Small Cells amongst operators

• Operators can share a Small Cell network or individual Small Cells

• Virtualization coordinated by cloud middleware to allocate virtual Small Cell slices to operators

• Small Cell network provider can be an operator or owner of real estate involved (e.g. shopping mall owner)

Small Cell Cluster Shared

Amongst Operators


• For Traditional Operators:

- Plug-n-play, heterogeneous small cell deployment – zero-touch, low-cost installation

- Dramatically reduced CAPEX and OPEX

- Self-organizing backhaul solution, reducing small cell backhaul cost by 7x – 10x

- Boosted monetization of small cell networks via maximized resource utilization and network sharing

• For Small Cell solution providers (network OEMs – e.g. Intel, NEC, BRCM)

- Differentiate offering via value-adding SW functionality – plug-n-play deployment and zero-touch operation, virtualization/ network-sharing, smart content distribution

• For new entrants (OTT Players, VNOs):

- Create self-organizing physical or virtual network by deploying small cells or sharing deployed networks

- End user trades free access for exclusive use of provider’s services (e.g. browser, ads, content)

- Monetize via new business models – content, ads, user data monetization

Value Proposition


Wrap Virtualization Is Not Just A Tech. It Is A Trend

• This trend has been running for decades since the development of the core concepts of Server virtualization in IT industry

• Introduction in the telco. domain began with the separation of the service logic from switching in SS7/AIN & continues today

• The third wave is just beginning and holds great promise if we can leap beyond the pragmatic beginnings & obvious benefits

• The third wave & the Network as a Service model can serve to completely rearchitect our industry value chain into a more sustainable model – Not a radical future but an essential one

• Virtualization is driving our new economy and we must keep open minds to new virtualization possibilities in the future – This roadmap has been rolling for a long time & will continue

• InterDigital is developing an orchestration and management solution for this future that can provide benefits today


Alan Carlton InterDigital Europe, Ltd. 64 Great Eastern Street London, EC2A 3QR +44 207 749 4189 [email protected] www.linkedin.com/in/alancarlton

08

May

Thank You!