SDN – the only way to go

Rene Princz-Schelter, Director of Presales and Product Marketing at Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise, argues that the only way to meet the challenges of massive smartphone growth – 1million by 2015, machine to machine (M2M) networking over $85B by 2017, big data volume doubling every two years – is SDN. Classic architecture of over-provisioning by just adding more boxes and bandwidth is expensive, and only uses 10% of the network capacity. The networks of the future need intelligence that supplies the level of service depending on the application and demand – not the number of boxes.
The list of IT-based media applications continues to grow – from digital media and healthcare applications to video content distribution and media cloud storage. For the user, with a smartphone, tablet and laptop, real-time applications such as video are all increasingly being held to work to a higher standard than best-effort applications such as email. The need for a Quality of Experience (QoE) on demand is a problem that is becoming much more evident as user requirements continue to evolve.

Add to this an increase in Machine to Machine (M2M) technology – witness telematics-based insurers where usage data is sent from a car across the network to the insurance company. In this scenario, we have the need for big data analytics to profile a policy price that matches drivers’ usage and habits – so it's easy to see how this all adds additional burden to the network.

All these applications have data throughput requirements and traffic patterns unlike any previously seen in the IT industry, and as a result, large and continuously changing north-south and east-west data transfers are overwhelming many traditional enterprise networks.

A permanent state of congestion that classic over-provisioning just can’t resolve
This has created a permanent state of congestion that the classic route of over-provisioning with expensive, high-end switches cannot resolve. And many enterprises do take this route, building large networks with large switches, which are still unable to cope with bursts in traffic on the network.
As such, the concept of SDN is gaining significant attention as a viable solution, enabling the provisioning of new services and reliable application delivery in a dynamic infrastructure. What we have now is a deliverable solution.

What does an end-to-end SDN solution look like?
The networks of the future need intelligence built into the infrastructure that supplies the level of service required depending on the application and demand – not the number of boxes.

Enterprises need a highly flexible, dynamic, integrated, easy-to-use solution to design, deploy, configure and manage their high-performance IP networks. As new applications add workflows and traffic patterns on the network, SDN² allows cost-effective and modular expansion of existing network infrastructure and avoids having to over-provision with expensive high-end switches.

Luc Andries, CTO, SDNsquare, a new global partner of Alcatel-Lucent, commented on his company’s rationale and experiences in the delivery of the industry’s first end-to-end SDN solution.

"Within an intelligent SDN solution, it's possible to take the knowledge out of each individual switch and control it elsewhere. As such, the SDN principle can be used twice within an end-to-end approach – firstly, in the traditional sense of the network being controlled externally via software, and secondly, it can be used to influence the flows within the network. That’s why we call our solution SDN."

For example, video applications have particular challenges – if we compare the use of video to the use of a search engine on a slow network, video content is useless. So a solution is required in order to make SDN a reality.

Expert systems – deployment in less than 15 minutes
Guarantee loss-less network paths with minimum jitter and latency – this means controlling complex interactions between bursty large data transfers and this can only be managed by providing central intelligence rather than individual switch configuration.

“We are 100% focused on Alcatel-Lucent’s approach to SDN," continued Andries. "Why? Because we have been able to take a deeper dive into the powerful OmniSwitch 6900 to exploit powerful features available. Our SDN² approach at SDNsquare together with Alcatel-Lucent Enterprise is unique in taking into account the whole network. Rather than each switch working individually and locally within the network, we have built an underlying expert system which automatically – and intelligently – handles all the detailed network configurations. No longer does the user have to define elements such as virtual local area networks, access control lists or routing tables. Our Expert System constructs a network topology and configuration for you – and this can be ready for deployment in less than 15 minutes."

SDN² intelligence – it’s like having a network engineer in a box
The technology presents a revolutionary approach to enabling rich media content to be treated, processed, stored and transported independently of the video or picture format. This is accomplished by providing highly automated, flow-based, end-to-end network provisioning, guaranteeing dedicated network resources and optimal bandwidth utilization for each flow.

It's possible to centralise the control plane with an external SDN expert system, reducing the complexity of network design and management by introducing three key concepts:
1. Using a graphical design wizard to facilitate the design of modular SDN² network topologies using predefined templates
2. Adding clients/servers as nodes to the network topology
3. Provisioning individual data flows between nodes.

As flows are managed end-to-end through the network, the SDN² approach takes care of the individual switch configurations along each optimally selected path. In this way, the system can guarantee loss-less transfer of each flow at the provisioned speed, thereby eliminating congestion and traffic interference inherent in any traditional IP network.

"And it's possible to configure and manage the network via a simple, intelligent graphical interface which can design the network in minutes. The ability to simulate the network on the interface enables enterprises to configure the network in full in an intelligent way – it's almost like having a network engineer in a box!" added Andries.

The benefits of an end-to-end solution are threefold: to the end users active on the network, the IT teams managing the network and ultimately, to the bottom line. An SDN approach ensures that the network is no longer a bottleneck for applications which require higher bandwidth, or have higher priority across the network. Enabling efficient large data transfers, completing complex network designs and deployments within minutes and allowing modular network upgrades, end-to-end SDN solutions enable enterprises to migrate easily between 1Gb switching and 10Gb.

And most importantly, such an approach can see significant cost savings, not only in 100% utilisation of the provisioned network, but also in the reduced expenditure on expensive equipment – SDN² uses low-end switch devices, eliminating the need for big network chassis – as well as the potential to consolidate between four and eight 1Gb servers into just one single 10Gb server.

All in all, the adoption of SDN will depend on companies creating a product that works. And we believe that our SDN² approach is the first step in providing something concrete for enterprises to utilise as part of an SDN approach.