B2B2X Service Bundling Project Paper – TMF Live 2014

TMF Live 2014

B2B2X Service Bundling Catalyst Project Paper

Primer, Scope & Demonstration Scenarios

Participants

Service Provider & “Bundler”

NFV Product Supplier

Fibre Access Network

Fibre Access Network

Champions & Supporters

Providing Requirements, Viewing Results

Best Practice Wholesale B2B Project Paper – TMF Nice 2013 Page | 1

The New Digital Services Market

The ecosystem for digital services is undergoing another major transformation. The combination of high speed broadband access and cloud compute capability is stimulating innovation and bringing a wave of industry transformation. Significant parts of the emerging new ecosystem have started to form and need to be seriously considered by those who wish to play a role. It is now apparent for most organizations that the most efficient way to buy compute resources is to use IAAS services and for many applications, a cloud software service provides a superior or lower cost option to in-house options. And now network equipment is facing the same pressures with Network Function Virtualization exploiting well priced commodity IAAS compute capacity to virtualize network functions which have traditionally been implemented on physical network hardware devices.

What is B2B2X? B2B2X Partnering is a TMForum best practice initiative which achieves integration through a set of mature, well thought through interaction process touch-points. In best practice implementations the data includes a dynamic component which can be used for product definitions and other specifications. The dynamic component facilitates business interactions by enabling buyers and suppliers to integrate with multiple partners for any valid version of any product, through a single interface. This capability is fundamental to support a marketplace of buyers and suppliers. Shared product definitions are expressed using SID specifications for dynamic extensibility. The TM Forum has developed B2B2X guides based on the B2B2X implementations are now present in the UK, Australia, Japan and New Zealand, with many hundreds of Service Providers and interest growing in other markets.

Converge Cloud, NFV and Fibre Access This B2B Catalyst Project is assembling components from dynamic catalogs which are sourced from three different suppliers using the B2B2X specification to bundle into a higher value offer. Supplier products Supplier products used in the demonstration include an NFV firewall, IAAS and Fibre Access. This project extends the application of TMForum best practices into the new domain of Network Function Virtualization and shows how an Agile business can leverage traditional and new technologies in concert. The project will be sharing machine readable product definitions between partners where the definitions are instantiated using the dynamic product service and resource patterns of the SID. The structure and rules of the bundled product are composed from supplier components and stored in a catalog. The delivery of the composed product is achieved through B2B interfaces employing standardized Touchpoints with re-usable interfaces that enable Digital Services Providers to incorporate any valid version of any product from any Supplier within their bundles. The combination of these technologies makes product composition from multiple partners a repeatable, systematic process that can be operated at scale, with many partners, many products and many combinations of products. TMForum demonstration in the project;

Dynamic data patterns of the SID

B2B2X Touchpoints

B2B2X over ebXML

TMForum REST API with proposed V2 extras

TMF SOAP PSA Interface Outputs of the project;

Contribution to Best Practice Guide for using the SID Product Service and Resource Model and Dynamic Patterns

Tailored PoC (Proof of Concept) outputs for the Project Champions

Best Practice Wholesale B2B Project Paper – TMF Nice 2013 Page | 2

Implementation Considerations

When it comes to B2B2X implementation there are a number of additional key innovations that can simplify business for the Supplier.

Consistent approach to internal and external suppliers Cloud and VNF resources may offer unique value propositions compared to traditional Telco resources and appear to be managed in a completely different way. However, it is important to take a holistic approach to orchestrating resources and bundling these at the service and product layers, whether these are internal or external resources.

A Web Portal to Support Phased B2B Adoption When an Interface is launched, the uptake of B2B integration is inevitably progressive. To add to this, suppliers often have the challenge of slow initial uptake when they launch products. In order to achieve a smooth uptake of B2B amongst buyers, the supplier should provide a Web Portal that maintains parity with the B2B interface. There may also be Trading Partners who choose to utilise the portal for some transactions on an on-going basis. The good news here is that in the same way that the data elements, rules and validations of a Product or other Specification can be used to form and validate B2B messages, they contain a complete set of data required to dynamically render web portal screens. It therefore becomes possible to have both buyers and suppliers utilizing a mix of the web portal and the B2B interface for exactly the same interactions. The same buyer or supplier can utilise a mix of both the web portal and the B2B interface. In fact this specification driven approach can be used to dynamically drive a broad range of digital channels, ebXML B2B, REST APIs, SOAP B2B, Web Portal and Mobile Applications. Interaction parity can be achieved through all digital channels.

ABOUT DGIT DGIT is performing the Service Provider Bundler role in this project using the new Telflow 3 product. Telflow is the Dynamic Service Delivery Platform for Telco and Cloud Providers;

Configure what others code.

Orchestrate internally and across partners

TMF based pre-built integration

Plug in Partners ABOUT CISCO Cisco is contributing the “Supplier” infrastructure representing the Network Function Virtualisation (NFV) exposed through a management and orchestration solution for Virtual Network Functions from the Cisco Evolved Services Platform, which is an NFV network and orchestration solution for Virtual Network Function management including orchestration of the underlying virtual compute, storage and network components. Cisco is also contributing the Infrastructure as a Service component via its Global Intercloud, an offering with its global partners to deliver a new enterprise-class portfolio of cloud IT services for businesses, service providers and resellers.

RESOURCES TM Forum B2B2X Partnering Accelerator http://www.tmforum.org/B2B2XPartneringAccelerator/15671/home.html

DGIT TELFLOW www.telflow.com

SID BEST PRACTICE http://dgit.biz/telflow-dynamic-product-implementation-contributed-to-the-tmforum/

CISCO http://www.cisco.com/c/en/us/products/cloud-systems-management/prime-fulfillment/index.html