Today at MWC 2018, VMware showcased how the company’s portfolio of offerings are helping communications service providers (CSPs) prepare for the imminent 5G world, where the ability to quickly build and launch new services will be critical for success.
CSPs are faced with high customer expectations, a portfolio of undifferentiated voice and data services, decreasing average revenue per user (ARPU), increasing infrastructure costs, and growing competition.

Working with VMware, customers can accelerate their network transformation and modernisation with network functions virtualisation (NFV) to support efficient delivery of virtualised versions of current services such as Voice over LTE (VoLTE), IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) and evolved packet core (EPC).

CSPs can also prepare for new service opportunities such as software-defined wide-area networks (SD-WAN), cloud migration, workspace management, and Internet of Things (IoT) services.

“CSPs must deliver new and differentiated services faster in an on-demand model to assist them today, as well as for the 5G future. This will require a transition to a cloud-centric virtualised infrastructure and service delivery model that is agile, automated, open, and software-defined,” says Shekar Ayyar, executive vice-president and GM: telco group at VMware.

“VMware provides an innovative and production-proven software platform with 20 years of domain expertise in virtualisation and cloud to help lead CSPs and telcos into next-generation distributed cloud leadership. Making this transition will enable CSPs to drive top line growth, improve bottom line performance, and retain and grow both their consumer and enterprise customer bases.”

VMware provides the essential software foundation that delivers a common infrastructure and operating environment spanning private, public, and Telco Distributed Clouds. VMware offers an optimal environment for telcos and CSPs to run, manage, connect, and secure all their applications and network functions – custom-built, packaged, virtualised, cloud-native, and SaaS.

CSPs are increasingly turning to VMware for:

* Production-Proven NFV: VMware vCloud NFV provides common virtualised infrastructure, operations management, and service assurance across private, public, and Telco Distributed Clouds. The vCloud NFV platform enables CSPs and telcos to deploy a multi-vendor and multi-function NFV platform that delivers service automation, high-performance networking, secure multi-tenancy, operations management, and carrier grade reliability. The platform supports traditional and cloud native applications and is expected to expand to offer enhanced, high-performance networking based on DPDK principles.

* Fastest Path to Production OpenStack: Through VMware Integrated OpenStack-Carrier Edition, VMware delivers the fastest path to deploying production NFV services on OpenStack. VMware Integrated OpenStack-Carrier Edition is fully tested, certified, and integrated with VMware’s NFV infrastructure platform. Using VMware Integrated OpenStack as an NFV Virtualised Infrastructure Manager (VIM), network architects can easily deploy, upgrade, and operate an OpenStack cloud on top of VMware’s carrier-grade NFVI platform. VMware vCloud NFV-OpenStack brings native support for container-based Virtualised Network Functions (VNF) through integrated container management, enabling VM and container-based VNFs to run on a single VIM.

* Support for Containers and Cloud Native Apps: Pivotal Container ServiceTM (PKS) enables CSPs to deliver production-ready Kubernetes on VMware vSphere and Google Cloud Platform (GCP), with constant compatibility to Google Container Engine (GKE). PKS helps operations teams deliver a hardened, maintainable container platform, while giving developers on-demand access to a production-ready environment featuring high availability, security, and multi-tenancy across private and public clouds.

* Integration with Public Clouds: Through VMware Hybrid Cloud Extension, CSPs can extend their VMware-based environments to the public cloud including VMware Cloud on AWS for on-demand capacity, and expand to new locations and geos quickly, without the need to replatform, retest, or change cloud tooling, all while maintaining business continuity, application uptime, network architectures, and performance.

* Industry-Leading VNF Certification Program and Ecosystem Partners: VMware has created a true marketplace for CSP customers to build new services based on best-in-class virtual network functions, with a growing ecosystem of more than 60 Virtual Network Functions from more than 30 vendors worldwide certified as VMware Ready for NFV. By deploying the vCloud NFV platform, CSP customers can build, provision and, sell new services in days instead of months, positively influence customer quality of experience, and significantly improve OPEX and CAPEX. In partnership with Dell EMC, and an extended portfolio of complementary innovative offerings from Dell Technologies, VMware can offer a range of end-to-end solutions for CSPs.

VMware offers CSPs a growing portfolio of offerings that can open new high-margin revenue streams, expand opportunities with enterprise customers, and unlock opportunities to further develop services that include consultative/strategic, deployment, support, and managed services offerings.

VMware’s expanded portfolio for telcos includes:

* Branch Networking (SD-WAN): With VeloCloud Cloud-Delivered SD-WAN, VMware equips CSPs with the ability to service enterprise needs as a managed service provider. SD-WAN managed services provide a less costly and complex network connectivity option that complements a CSPs existing services portfolio. And VeloCloud Cloud-Delivered SD-WAN can be deployed as a turnkey service or as a VNF on customer premise equipment (CPE), increasing agility, improving time to revenue, and reducing operational costs. In a multi-cloud world, where enterprises will have applications and services residing in their private cloud as well as in the public cloud, VeloCloud enables CSPs to provide the connectivity with the reliability and security that enterprise customers demand.

* Empowering the Digital Workspace: VMware enables CSPs to offer a range of enterprise mobility and workspace management services for customers at all stages of the digital workspace journey. VMware Workspace ONE, powered by AirWatch technology, enables management and security of all customer devices, including BYO devices and those sold by the operator. CSPs are also adding digital workspace services through Workspace ONE, which optimises mobile user productivity and convenience by enabling an any app, any device experience. By offering all applications–mobile, web, Windows, virtual, or cloud–through a single app portal with identity integration for single sign-on, CSPs can further maximise revenue from enterprise data usage, software resale, and services opportunities.

* Public and Hybrid Cloud Extension: Hybrid Cloud Extension enables CSPs to offer enterprise customers instant connectivity to large-scale clouds for their IT as well as network function workloads. Hybrid Cloud Extension enables CSPs to help enterprise customers utilise the best of connected cloud data centers with the most current VMware SDDC offerings while maintaining business continuity, application uptime, network architectures, and performance.

VMware helps CSPs maximise the opportunity for IoT internally, and with customers, by streamlining how they deploy, manage, monitor, and secure IoT infrastructure. VMware supports customers across the entire IoT value chain – things, edge, data, network, applications, and users – with secure, enterprise-grade, end-to-end operations management, and infrastructure solutions for IoT. With VMware, customers can manage across millions of things as easily as one, operate smarter with an accurate health of all things, and innovate faster by speeding up delivery of IoT use cases.