By Igor Dayen, SP Product and Solutions Marketing
Let’s take a look at the word “Cloud”… Five years ago, so many of you had ongoing debates on what is a Cloud and what isn’t a Cloud. And now “Cloud” is ubiquitous: it is a term that is well recognized and used. We are now going through the same motion when it comes to discussing the terms “NfV” and “SDN”.
We are pretty new to these methodologies, are trying to jumpstart corresponding conversations, and lastly, figure out how they can propel SP business forward. That is why we are engaging you into such discussions and talk to you copiously about the Virtual Network Index (VNI) and Monetization and Optimization Index (MOI).
The VNI has been accurate in predicting traffic explosion over the past five years and the MOI gave you an opportunity to learn about the benefits of a modernized SP architecture and showed how you can arrive at the new revenue streams. “NfV” and “SDN” are the pillars for transforming your business and is a new way of addressing traffic growth challenges. You also know that not only Enterprises but also SMB customers want to benefit from an automated self-service approach to buying SP services. This translates into an opportunity for your customers to focus on their core business and thus spend less time maintaining their networks. Virtualization and programmability will help you as a service provider make services delivery more agile as well as lower your Total Cost of Ownership (TCO). Once you lower your TCO, you can pass the savings onto your customers and reduce customer churn.
This is exactly the type of conversations we held at Cisco Live Milan where we provided proof points of the Cisco Open Network Strategy. Please read my blog on Cisco Live for more details to learn about the SP presence in Milan and what the hot demos were. I would like to let you in on a secret … the booth was very busy as we fostered a number of good discussions, fielded a number of hot questions and, in my opinion, we succeeded in moving the needle in explaining how we can help service providers modernize their infrastructure.
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