When it comes to the management and network orchestration (MANO) of emerging NFV-based telco architectures, the choice of a vendor is certainly not a “no-brainer.” Of course, no self-respecting carrier should ever make vendor selection a “no-brainer,” but when it comes to MANO, the number of potential candidate companies is increasing all the time.
To make the point, let’s start from perhaps one of the simplest network vendor selection processes: RAN. It’s simple (note: I didn’t say easy) because all mobile carriers know who could supply their RAN and the candidate list is fairly short. RAN is definitely in the “network” space and only a few, high-profile network suppliers have RAN portfolios on offer. See? Simple.
Now let’s think about managing a network using OSS: the supplier list starts to lengthen because OSS is an “IT” system managing the “network.” So, you also have to add in the IT guys. Some of the network guys are IT guys too, but you also have to include the IT guys who are not network guys (h/t Donald Rumsfeld). Carriers know about the network and IT players get involved in the network all the time, although sometimes this leads to CTO/CIO conflicts. So far, so good, right? Continue reading “Oh Carrier Man, Where You Gonna Run To? (For Your MANO)”