ADVA Optical Networking and BT show real value of Transport

Jointly developed with BT and ScheduALL (a resource management solution provider), the demonstration shows how simply and rapidly service providers can provision new services and fulfill the needs of end customers. Built around the ADVA FSP 3000 platform and featuring Reconfigurable Add/Drop Multiplexers (ROADMs) and the new ADVA Network Hypervisor, the demonstration essentially virtualizes the connectivity network and integrates it into a bandwidth-allocation application. OpenDaylight controllers are used to ensure effective communication between the virtualized network and the higher-layer application.

"We've worked closely with ADVA Optical Networking and ScheduALL to develop the demonstration and underline why transport SDN is a very promising development," said Paul Gunning, principal researcher, BT.

In addition to showing how easy it is to activate new services in a highly automated way, ADVA Optical Networking's joint SDN and OpenFlow World Congress demonstration reveals how simple it is to overlay services on top of multi-layer connectivity networks without the need for an extensive system integration effort. The demonstration uses commercially available OpenFlow Ethernet switches to show how new services can be provisioned in both the optical as well as the Ethernet layer. To develop such a solution in today's networks would require expensive and time-consuming system integration and solution-specific software development. Something that often proves too costly for service providers to consider. What's more, service providers also need to contemplate the openness of the demonstration's ecosystem. OpenFlow protocols and open source OpenDaylight controllers play an instrumental role in tying the application software to the multi-layer connectivity network. This level of openness in combination with standardized interfaces decouples network innovation from often complex network integration.

"We're working with BT and ScheduALL to show the world the true potential of transport SDN, to show the true impact it can have on both a service provider's network and, ultimately, its bottom line," commented Christoph Glingener, CTO, ADVA Optical Networking. "Our demonstration at the SDN and OpenFlow World Congress is one of the first in the world to show service providers how easily you can virtualize the connectivity network and integrate it into higher layer applications. No more hype or discussions, no more theoretical explorations, this demonstration clearly underscores the true possibilities of what transport SDN can deliver in a service provider's network. The level of service provisioning and automation is something that service providers have been moving towards for many, many years. With the ecosystem that we're demonstrating here, we're showing that programmability is not a single feature on a single box - it requires interoperability and openness. It requires programmability by design."