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Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (00:24):
Hello, you are watching the Cloud Native Telco Summit part of our year-Round DSP Leaders coverage. And it's time now for our live Q and A show. I'm Guy Daniels and this is the first of three q and a shows. We have another one at the same time tomorrow and again on Thursday. Now, if you are a new viewer and joining us for the first time, then welcome to you and let me tell you about the format. This is your chance to ask questions on cloud native and how it impacts telcos. The question form is right there on the webpage and your questions come straight through to me here in the studio. Now, as part of today's summit, we featured a panel discussion that looked at the essential components of a cloud native strategy for telcos. The panel has been available to watch on demand all day, but if you have not yet seen it, don't worry because we will be broadcasting it immediately after this live show ends.
(01:30):
So don't go away. Keep your browser tab open. We have already received a number of questions from you, but if you haven't yet sent us one, then please do so now using the q and a form on the website. Well, I'm delighted to say that joining me live on the program today are Beth Cohen, SDN Network Product Strategy at Verizon Business Group, Joan Triay manager and Network architect, docomo Euro Labs and Rapporteur of the Etsi, I-S-G-N-F-V, Sidd Chenumolu, who is head of product Management, the software defined edge division at VMware by Broadcom and Michele d'agostino, who is Director of Product Management at Wind River. Hello everyone. Really good to see you all again. Thanks so much for returning for this live show's a real favorite of mine, the live shows. Now let's get straight to our first audience question. And the question is quite simply, is Cloud native the best approach for every telco irrespective of their size and geography? Well, Michele perhaps we can come across to you first for your thoughts on this. Should every telco be looking seriously at cloud native?
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (02:55):
Sure, thank you. So we've been talking in this summit about how cloud native is a powerful approach for telecom, and the question really alludes to the fact whether this is the best fit for each and every telco, which is fair enough. Well, in my view, the whole world is definitely moving to cloud native and it is proven that this aggregation of hardware and software is the way forward. Now, I would distinguish between two scenarios or two types of telcos. On the one hand you get the big and medium telcos, for example, Vodafone, Verizon Telos in Canada that have already started to deploy cloud native networks and are already benefit the benefits of that cloud native brings. On the other hand, maybe initially it is true that it may be difficult for some of those maybe smaller telco operators to move straight away to cloud native, maybe because they have constraints in terms of lack of expertise, maybe because they have very specific regulatory constraints or maybe because they simply don't think that cloud native is mature.
(04:01):
So maybe they'll just have what they call a wait and see strategy. But I really think that eventually they will all move. In fact, there is an interesting study a couple of months ago from Analysis Mason where one of the conclusion was that most of the CSPs would now believe that performance maturity and TCO for cloud native native networks are being taken care of. And now the focus is only on operational aspects. And if I may add, there are some small but advanced CSPs like for example, Elisa in Finland who have already successfully embraced the whole cloud native paradigm and in fact they're very advanced and we have been helping them, for example, with automation as one of their requirements is to have to go to a dark knock. So to conclude, I think that although it must also be said that not all the workloads will move to cloud native, for me the answer is definitely yes and it's just a question of time.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (05:02):
Okay, thanks so much for those comments. So two distinct really groups there and it's all dependent on time and where they are in their journey. I guess Beth, did you want to come in on this question as well?
Beth Cohen, Verizon (05:15):
Yeah, cloud native for some telcos, particularly ones which by the way the larger ones are quite far into the journey, but they also have a huge amount of legacy, particularly on their OSS and BSS systems that make it difficult to get to be cloud native on that business. So it's really a mix. And the newer telcos of course can just dive in. I've always said that when you're starting out, you have a great advantage over the incumbents, which is you have a blank piece of paper in which you can write whatever you want. So you can actually start with a cloud native approach from day one because you don't have that enormous amount of technical debt that you've built up over the years. So yes, the trajectory is to get to be cloud native, but for some telcos, particularly the larger ones, it could take decades.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (06:21):
Great. Thanks so much Beth. As you say, it can take a lot of time this. Joan, did you also want to come in on this first question with your observations?
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (06:32):
Yes, thank you. I fully agree with what that indicated indeed for a big operator, like for example, in our case, it's not so easy to transition from day zero to day one already into the cloud P. And even though I didn't really think about it from a geographical point of view, which was part of the question, I guess that there are also different cultures and different ways of operation of the operators. For example, speaking in my case representing Domos Japanese operator, there are different ways of operation that might not be the same for other operators in Western Europe or in North America. For example. We've been based a lot on workflow based operations that typically is very much associated on following a more imperative way of management, which is not one of the ways that are envisioned for the cloud native ecosystem. So I would say that even though there is potentially no restriction not for any kind of operator, regardless of the size or the geography, we have to understand that there are different cultural backgrounds and different modes of operation. And for that it might happen that for some operators it's more difficult to transition than others.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (08:05):
Yeah, it's interesting Joan, thank you very much for that. And it's an interesting aspect of that question that looking at the geographical differences and as you translate that into cultural differences, that's something to be very aware of. And if any of our viewers are from operators who fall into that category, then please do get in touch with us and send in your views alongside your questions and we'd like to read those out. Okay. Unless we have any other responses to that opening question, should we move on to our next one then? And this second question we have in from our audience asks the question, what are the key factors that are enabled by cloud native environment that contribute to revenue increase for a telco as opposed to cost reductions? We hear a lot about cost savings, but what about new revenue opportunities? Sid, are you able to start us off with some thoughts on this question?
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (09:10):
Yes, sure. Thanks for that. I think revenue I'll call as part of monetization. So I view monetization and modernization as the two sites of the same coin and monetization is really directly related to the top line growth that the company is expecting by developing new products and services. And this really translates to the cloud native nature of the service layer itself. It's not so much about the network, but on the top layer how cloud native which increase the velocity to deliver our change of service is quite important. On the network side, the same layer is integrating on the network side, which it becomes an enabler for such services. So think of it like you want to offer a new service that's going to increase the monetization or increase the top line growth of a company, but it really requires enable underneath it to correspondingly take actions for that particular service or new offering of that kind. So I view it may not play a direct role. A cloud native may say that's going to directly increase the revenue of a company or top line growth, but it is the key enabler. Without that the growth rate would be significantly hampered. That's how we look at it.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (10:28):
That's interesting. Thank you Sidd. So more of a supporting role than as you were saying, an enabling role. Beth, have you got similar thoughts as to the revenue generating impact of Cloud native?
Beth Cohen, Verizon (10:41):
Well, I'm going to go into a somewhat different direction. What I've seen is that the telcos are traditionally kind of slow at rolling out new products because I always say as a telco we need to always deliver very stable products. That's what customers expect. So cloud native can really speed up the time to market for new products, which is something that we really need to concentrate on because I'll use for example, a lot of products that rely on the integration of network and security. Security is becoming a big problem increasingly targets of bad actors. And by using cloud native capabilities we can then drive those new products and those new applications out faster. And so that is where I think cloud native can really help and we can take what we've learned from the website industry and the gaming industry and other industries where they're constantly evolving new products very quickly and apply it to the telco industry in new ways, but yet at the same time maintain our capabilities for delivering very stable products. So it's a little bit of a mix. Yeah, obviously there is some push for reducing costs. So though I would argue we don't see cost reduction as much as was promised, but speed to market is certainly I think paramount.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (12:37):
Great. Thanks Beth. Speed to market. Great. Another kind of supporting or less direct, I guess advantage of cloud native when it comes to revenue. Now I think we've got a couple more views and comments on this one. Michele, did you want to come in as well?
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (12:52):
Yeah, I agree with many of the things that were said already and specifically I would like to build up on the point that Beth made on the time to market. And I think in general this is a very good question because normally the focus is on technology and total cost of ownership, which of course are table stake for telcos. But it is important to look at revenue. So for me, one factor that was discussed earlier is one of the benefits that cloud native brings and that's the agility and innovation. So cloud native architectures of course enable telcos to quickly deploy new services. And for example, I personally see a very big potential for service providers to leverage all the data that they have on the edge of the network to develop in the near future. For example, innovative CCB two x new services. And the beauty of that of cloud native is the fact that let's say that you have 5G CU and DU deployed running on a server on the edge, let's say on Dell or H HP servers, the same resources that are on that server may be used for new revenue generating services.
(14:02):
And because of that, I think it's very critical that all the components within the telco stack are optimized as much as possible and for example, including the cloud platform so that they have the smallest footprint possible.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (14:16):
Great, thanks Michele for those comments. And Joan, did you want to come in as well?
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (14:23):
Yes, actually my example was going to be very much the same that Mikala just explained. There is a great potential by adopting the cloud native solutions to have a unified and common infrastructure that can be used in a span all across all domains of the network. That single infrastructure can really provide to the operator the opportunity to deliver the services wherever they are needed with no restriction of whatever domain they need to be applied. That means that for example, being able to deploy applications at the edge but also in the core, one of the nice use cases for example that might come up in the future that could also be for good new sources of revenue is the capability of the operators of not just only providing networking services and connectivity services but also providing computation services like for example in the forms of in-network computing or in computing network. And that means that by using the same infrastructure, the same platform, I can use it to deliver new kinds of applications that are not just only for connectivity and they're already proof of concept and testing on these domains and they look very promising and it could be a good source of revenue for the future also for the operators.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (16:02):
Great. Well thanks everyone for those responses. Four very interesting answers there to that question. And don't forget, please keep sending in your questions. I'm looking at them right here in front of me in the studio. So please if you've got a question, send one in. Well talking to questions, let's move on to our next viewer question. And this is a question that connects cloud native with 5G. Let me read out this question for you. 5G deployments are progressing worldwide but the pace is not what telco's vendors had counted on and the revenue benefits are lower than what the operators expected. Is it therefore too late for cloud native to make improvements and course corrections in the 5G era? Okay, so our viewers made some assumptions there about maybe vendors not being too happy, operators not being too happy, can cloud native make some positive changes and as they say, course corrections. Beth, I'm sure you'd like to have some comments on this one.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (17:08):
So technology always takes longer than we think to become to become deployed and five GI think was probably overhyped because I've been hearing about 5G and how great it's going to save the world for probably at least five years at this point. Not to knock 5G. 5G is absolutely here, it's absolutely being used but it's not being used in the way we thought it was going to be used because that's always the way new technology comes in. So yes, 5G is going to be deployed, I think we can work on it. I think there are some improvements. I know some of the open source projects O ran, I'll just use this an example, we'll really help push 5G further. I think also there needs to be more understanding of some of the further out use cases. I think the telcos were probably guilty of overhyping 5G and sort of saying, hey the average user will think it's fantastic, they'll be able to watch Korean soap operas and it'll look great. And the actual difference for the average user was not as much as they thought. On the other hand, other use cases are now becoming to the fore that will and are already revolutionizing 5G. So I think we do have an opportunity to course correct and I think we should.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (19:07):
Thanks very much Beth. Well yeah as you alluded to there we are in early stages of 5G. I mean what are we 20, 24, 4, 5 years, we've got a decade plus ahead of 5G in the network. Any more thoughts on this question? Sidd? Are you able to provide some insights as to is there a problem and can the adoption of cloud native help address and correct some of these?
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (19:33):
Yeah, I think I would like to echo some of the points that Beth made. And we also have to realize 5G was the first technology that was a use case driven. If we go back almost like seven, eight years and look at the triangle that ITU had released about IMT 2020, only one use case was for really people. Every other use case was really machine driven, whether it's a D to device to device or device to human or something like that. So again, as be said that it is progressing well. A lot of deployments have happened but one should also realize that 5G is not just a singular technology. There are three things that have happened. One is we have a service-based architecture which was completely new, that was defined by three gpp as Beth said, open ran is the new one and also for the first time telcos adopting the cloud. So three big transformations which are foundational nature are being done as part of 5G. So I can understand why people may think that progress is slow, but it's not the case that telcos globally are adopting these changes and the benefits are slowly going to show up. Right now the focus has been on the consumer side, but as the use cases, many of the POCs that has been alluded to are happening. I really think that the benefits of 5G and connectivity for B2B or B two B2B will really shape up.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (21:00):
Great, thanks very much Sidd. And as you quite rightly pointed out there, there's a number of aspects to 5G. Often think 5G is a bit of an oversimplified abstraction to encompass what's actually going on there. We have other comments, Michele, let's come across to you.
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (21:16):
No, so from my point of view is not too late and although the statement in the question is true, I believe that accelerating the pace is accelerating and we've seen that in for example in the UK where another operator just launched 5G SA. And although it may be true that initial 5G deployments didn't deliver the anticipated revenue that everyone expects every time there is a new g, I believe that cloud native can be really critical to unlock the full potential of 5G and it can definitely help from a revenue perspective. And if I can think about two aspects that can help with that. One is for sure agility and scalability so that the service providers can launch services much faster than before. But the number two is, and probably the most important in my humble opinion is automation, which is enabled by cloud native. And with automation we can reduce operational complexities.
(22:16):
So for example, what we have done with data operations at scale where we've introduced the declarative model to provide upgrades and updates that can basically minimize the impact or the impact of this on service or we can employ the use of AI techniques that are easier to implement in a virtualized run compared to a traditional run. And then you can use that for example, for anomaly detection and resolution. And also something else that we have done recently is employing gen ai, which I know is new and there is a lot of hype around it but you can use or we've been using large language models in order to look at real time issues and resolve them through natural language user interactions in order to troubleshoot issues. And why is this important? It is important because by increasing the quality of experience in the network you are automatically minimizing churn in the network, churn from customers and therefore you attract new customers and this is a way to increase revenue in my opinion.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (23:29):
Fantastic, thanks very much. And Beth, let's go straight back to you for some additional comments.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (23:36):
Yeah, I wanted to talk a little bit about one of the 5G technologies that was hyped very early, which is network slicing. And not to say that network slicing isn't still coming, it is, but it has definitely lagged in terms of deployments and I think when it does come, which will be in the next couple of years, I think that will really make 5G far more useful for many use cases so that we can better manage the network and shape the traffic so that we can have some applications in some users have better performance for their applications. One of the things I think we forget about 5G is that the use cases are really focused on applications and I think that's kind of gotten forgotten in the shuffle and over the next couple years am hoping to see that swing back, that pendulum swing back as we deploy network slicing out within the 5G framework.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (24:53):
Okay, thanks very much Beth. We will keep our eyes open and watch out for that. And as you say, it's hard, it's hard to predict these use cases in advance and also the timings and when they're all going to take off. Okay, I think we have addressed that question very nicely. It's time now though to check in on our audience poll for the cloud native telco summit and as always we ask our audience a related question and give a selection of multiple choice answer options. Well the question we are asking you this week is cloud native can deliver substantial benefits to telcos but what are the main challenges to its adoption? And you can see the real time results appearing right here over on my right shoulder there early days on the poll, we've still got to open a few more days, it's quite spread out. What's this maturity of cloud native software from vendors is ranking quite highly and I know we addressed that on a future panel in this year's summit. Good to see difficulties in recruiting or hiring talent currently ranking low as a positive. Well look, if you've yet to vote, please do so. You can influence the results here. The more votes we get, the better it is. We will take another look at the voting during tomorrow's live q and a show.
(26:21):
We still have time for more questions of course. And let's get straight onto our next one. And let me read out the question the questioner asks, I am surprised to learn from the earlier panel today that day two support is weak. Can you elaborate on the reasons here and what vendors can do to help? Okay, well there's a question directly related to today's panel and Beth, I am pretty sure you brought up the subject of day two during that discussion. So perhaps we can come to you first for some thoughts and if you can elaborate and explain what you mean and how vendors can help.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (27:06):
I did indeed bring that up as a telco operator and I'm in the product side of the house, I am very well aware of what it takes to do day two. In fact our ROI comes out of how efficient we can run day twos. So I think it's important for us to focus on that. And cloud native doesn't really address most of day two issues because day two issues are focused on process and efficiency of process and it relies on, and I mentioned this earlier in this call, BSS and OSS systems that the vendors have not particularly focused on making the BSS and OSS systems cloud native particularly. So I think that's where the vendors can really help. Those systems tend to lag from a technology perspective. They're bread and butter, the billing systems, the ticketing systems, the systems that keep everything alive and reporting systems.
(28:24):
And I think that there can be a focus on improving those systems and making them more efficient and more match better with the technology that we're doing on the network side to make everything cloud native. And I think there is a real opportunity for better integration of those systems to show that they can, everything can be cloud native, which gives us the flexibility to change things on the fly. And again, referring back to my earlier comment about flexibility and time to market as a person who launches new products frequently, probably 70% of the issues we run into launching new products has to do with the backend systems and not the actual products that we launch. Those are pretty straightforward, but integrating with our backend systems, figuring out how to bill, how to support them, that's where we run into the issues.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (29:33):
Great, thanks very much for elaborating there. Beth and Joan, I think you've got some comments here and we, we've talked on the summit in previous years about day zero, day one, quite a lot, but day two is now coming up this year. What are your thoughts? Is there an issue here and what can we do to help?
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (29:54):
Indeed? I think that maybe this is just also my perception that there is a little bit of too much focus on the day zero and day one. So solutions, proof of concepts, trying to see something that is being deployed and works, but this is not the end of the story. The operators, we are a lot more concerned actually on the day two and the long-term support. So we should focus more on that. And coming back to the question about how the vendors could potentially help on this, for instance, one of the efforts that we are spending nowadays a lot is on defining services provided by the platform that precisely focus on these data kind of functionalities like upgrades, configurations, traffic management and so on and so forth. And one of the good ways that probably the vendors could help is on trying to accommodate to the standards and the open source solutions that are being delivered in this domain and try to help and develop them.
(31:08):
More importantly is to make sure that once these implementations are accommodating to the standards in some way so that we can really integrate them with our OSS and BSS systems and the higher layer orchestration systems that we have otherwise, then of course we might fall into the trap of again getting some kind of silos. So in the end I would say that yes, there is a little bit of two rush on trying to get something to work, but more importantly is to make it work for a long term helping on these kind of functionalities from the very start in the standards and the open source that could be a win-win solution for both the operators and the vendors I believe.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (31:58):
Great. Thanks very much for those comments. Joan. Michele, let's come across to you as well for your comments on the day two issues.
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (32:09):
Yes, thank you. So during the panel I also provided my view from a vendor perspective and from a cloud perspective on data. I think what I said is that for telco deployments, for cloud native deployments to be successful, you will need to define cloud native platforms and solutions which deliver operations at scale, which include the full lifecycle including data, which is actually the most important step in the lifecycle as CSPs make regular updates and upgrades to their network. And you need to be able to deploy these software and to do these upgrades on tens of thousands of nodes simultaneously. So at the same time, and in my view or in my experience to achieve this, it is definitely important to augment the basic capabilities that Kubernetes provides with zero touch deployment at scale. And I can say that although of course more work is still required than as Beth was saying, we have done a lot of work to have a solution for data automation and we are actually very fortunate that we have had the benefit of being deployed at scale with our V run cloudified solution at Verizon. And this has definitely helped us to leverage our learning, not on paper, but in the field with a very demanding network to introduce already a high level of automation for day two for tens of thousands of nodes. So my view is that there is actually already great support for day two and there are solutions to perform fast and predictable upgrades while you also provide observability and analytics. Of course there is more work to do, but I think there's a big focus already on data.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (34:01):
Thanks very much Michele and Sidd, let's come across to you for your thoughts on this because you also referred to, you were talking about the data issues during our earlier panel.
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (34:11):
Yeah, so I think the previous comments were quite spot on, but just to add to that, there are two things I would call out that. One is in the day two, if not automation is one part of it, but more importantly one has to make sure that they have a deep observability on what's happening when a day two operation happens, whether it's an upgrade, update, any changes to the network, it's quite important for an operator to know exactly how the changes are being implemented and how to roll them back if things are not working properly. So I said they do run critical services in addition to that. The question itself as to how the vendors can help, I think one way could be that the vendors can bring in teams for transformation customer success, who can work with the operators to help them define the new processes that are really needed for transformation in the cloud native environment. This is fairly new to many operators and we work with dozens of operators globally on that and customers are quite appreciative of that. So customer success, this transformation processes, even the professional services that we offer, it's absolutely critical. The people who are offering services are also completely understand what cloud native is and advise the operators properly. Many times we have seen that the tech product might be cloud native, but the supporting service systems teams are not exactly on par to take the full benefit of that. So it has to come like a full package.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (35:44):
Great. The full package. Thank you very much Sidd for those additional comments. Thanks everyone for the comments on that question. And don't forget if you haven't seen it already, have a look at the panel we have for you today where we're go into more detail there, right? We've got time for at least one more question if not two. Here's another question we received a short time ago. Okay, the questions more for Kai at Deutsche Telekom who was enabled to join us for this live show, but we'll read out the question anyway. The Deutsche telekom speaker alluded to the hope that cloud native could remove the need for another major investment cycle and architecture upheaval that is surely due to come with six G is cloud native really in a position to perhaps lead a radical new change and approach. It was an interesting point made on that panel as to whether or not cloud native might be a catalyst for changing the way we go about the historic tenure cycles with cellular. Sidd, do you mind if I come across to you and get your thoughts on this first?
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (36:55):
Well, I'll be first to admit I don't exactly know what 60 G is and what's going to look like. It's like we are rewinding our clock going to the 5G and predicting what the 5G should look like 10 years from now. And we know for a fact that we just discussed, we are not completely right, but I think one difference is that six G, 5G, seven G, whatever GS may come later are standards driven. The cloud native is not just for telcos, cloud native is an ecosystem ecosystem that is defined not for just for telco but for enterprises IT and much more. And it's really an industry driven, ecosystem driven, in this case Linux foundations against cf. So what really means is that they're both running on parallel tracks at a different velocity. One is driven by standards with a long-term view and where we know exactly what we're going to get in long-term.
(37:56):
But on the cloud native side it's really driven by the contributors to the ecosystem and depending on the uptick of each features and functionality really defines where cloud-native or something like that would go forward. The exact interception is what we are trying to make it happen. We're trying to take the benefit of the surety of a standards driven by three GPP or an et cetera and multiplying that with the cloud native velocity to get the best for the operators. Now Cloud native really gives the abstraction. The abstraction is on the hardware side, abstractions for the software so that both software and the can also have their own velocity. I do think that cloud native will be the mainstay for next few years, whether it's community 60 or not, I can't say for sure, but definitely for next few years, cloud native will be the way to deploy new applications and whether we discussed about ai, if AI is here to stay, then definitely cloud native becomes the basics to enable AI there.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (39:04):
Very interesting. Thank you very much for that Sidd. We've got some additional comments as well. So Joan, let me come across to you first for your thoughts about whether or not cloud native can be a catalyst to lead a new change and a new approach to how we introduce new standards and technology.
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (39:24):
I would say that definitely yes. In the same way that also NFP started the same journey I would say with the transformation with the digital transformation of the operators, I many times referred that even though we know that we have not taken the full benefits yet of the 5G, I would say that the 5G was always defined in a way that it was already an native companies and operators. We knew the capabilities of disaggregation of our networks, decoupling of the software from the infrastructure and that opened up a new breadth of new opportunities on how to actually redefine our networks. So in many ways I already explained in some of the conferences and events that the 5G was already in n ft native and the same will happen with the CX G. I believe that the cloud native and the NFE technologies and concepts are real catalyst for the definition of the network.
(40:29):
And the good thing is that I believe that with these concepts by using Cloud native and NFE technologies operators will be able to manage in the future more smooth transitions of our networks. It might happen actually precisely that these 10 year cycles kind of get shortened or actually get kind of diffused because the network will evolve potentially in a more gradual way thanks to the enablers that all these cloud native ecosystem can provide. So indeed I believe that with the cloud native there can be potential for the future for the operators to have smoother transitions without having to think about so much radical changes. There will be radical changes I believe in terms of offering of services and applications, but those all will be just delivered by software. There will not be a major appeal on how to change our network in a sense since everything will be just treated as software as an application that can be deployed. And I made before just the example of the in network computing use cases, we are going to precisely and very potentially use the same infrastructure, the same platform that we deliver and we deploy our network functions for deploying any other kind of applications. And who knows, maybe those applications also become part of how we define the six G in the future. The good thing is that, as I said, because of using these technologies that cloud native and NV provides, there will not be a measure impact for the operator to deploy them and operator.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (42:26):
Interesting. Thanks very much Joan, for those comments. I think there's a lot of operators who would like to see a more granular evolution I think would help in many ways. Beth, what do you think? What are your views here?
Beth Cohen, Verizon (42:40):
I want to take it off in a little bit of a different direction because I'm seeing standards and open source need to work together more than they are today. I think there's been some convergence, but I think that needs to be continued convergence and that will really drive forward the cloud native capabilities in the longterm because cloud native really is a lot of open source of course with OpenStack and Kubernetes and all these other, Anique is another one that are coming from the software and technology perspective. And yet at the same time we have O ran and we have other standards coming through math and the API standards and I think they really need to converge to really take everything the cloud native technology forward so that it can be deployed in the way that Joanne was talking about, that we can speed the trajectory of incorporating new technologies and new products into our system, into the telco systems.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (44:02):
Great. Thanks very much Beth. And thanks everyone. Okay. I'm just checking our systems here and I think looking at the time, we've got time for one more question and we've got one that's just come in whilst you were speaking there, Beth. So apologies if I stumble over this one. I'm reading out directly. As I say, it's just come in, it's worth bringing to everyone. So the question asks, the panel topic today was the essential components for cloud native, I guess their company. We are being advised to start an AI transformation program and to integrate this with our preexisting cloud native work is this best practice. Okay, so is this from a telco, anonymous telco, should telcos integrate their potential AI work and AI network transformation work with their cloud native work? Are these two things that should be happening in parallel combined or should they be treated separately? Do we have any comments or anyone offering some help to our viewer there as to about whether that's a best practice or a viable alternative or any other ways of going about introducing AI and cloud native? Do you have any takers, anyone who wants to help out and just here? Oh dear. Well, this could be the, oh, Beth, thank you very much, Beth, you've got some comments to kick us off. Our viewer will be delighted please.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (45:37):
Other people will, I'm sure kick in, but AI is, I don't have to say it maximum hype right now. Not to say that AI and as machine learning, which I think is more important in the telco world isn't very important, but it's also still at the beginnings is cloud native and AI related only in the sense that cloud native allows us to do the massive amount of computations that are needed on the large language models and maintaining the giant databases that really run our AI systems behind the scenes. So absolutely it does help. Are they intimately related? In my opinion? Probably not, but we're on the beginnings of the AI journey. So where we are in five years will be completely different.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (46:48):
That is one absolute certainty. You're absolutely right. Thanks very much indeed for addressing that one for us. Beth and Sidd, you are going to come in with some extra comments as well, please.
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (46:59):
Yeah, I think quite an interesting question, right? I mean everyone's talking about AI nowadays. So the way I describe this AI is well scaling application in this case a model that runs on a workflow infrastructure at scale. So again, cloud native implementation is, think of it like an enabler for ai, but between the AI application on the top and the cloud native implementation, there's an aspect of data platform which is equally important and that is the one that ties to the cloud native aspect of it and also to the AI application, the data, what data gets collected and at what velocity is quite important for AI to work. Whether it's a predictive AI or I don't know what the application the person was asking question was intending to run, but let's assume it's a predictive ai. It really depends on what level of information that underlying infrastructure application is able to provide to the data model for the generative part to take action for rack. So cloud native does enable that. So think of it like again, cloud native allows AI to work smoothly, but again, there's a degree of separation between those two.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (48:10):
Fantastic. Thanks so much for coming on this one, Sidd, that's so much appreciated. Well, I do believe we are at the end of our show for this first day of the cloud native summit. We are out of time. Thank you so much to all of you who joined us for this live program. And do remember to send in your questions for tomorrow's live q and a show as soon as you can. Don't leave it too late. We've got a couple of questions just coming in right now. It's too late. We'll have to use 'em for tomorrow show. So please, as sooner the better. And also please do take part in the poll. There is still plenty of time for you to have your say. Well, you can find the full agenda for day two of the summit on the telecom TV website. We have a panel discussion on identifying new roles and developing new skills for cloud native telcos and we focus on a few emerging areas. Plus my colleague Rayla Matra speaks with BT about the increasing importance of the DevSecOps role. And if you don't know what that is, then please tune in to find out more. And remember, you can watch both of these programs on demand from tomorrow morning. And in case you missed today's panel discussion as mentioned earlier, we are going to broadcast it right now as soon as this program ends. We'll be back tomorrow with our second live q and A show, same time, same place. Until then, thanks for watching and goodbye.
Hello, you are watching the Cloud Native Telco Summit part of our year-Round DSP Leaders coverage. And it's time now for our live Q and A show. I'm Guy Daniels and this is the first of three q and a shows. We have another one at the same time tomorrow and again on Thursday. Now, if you are a new viewer and joining us for the first time, then welcome to you and let me tell you about the format. This is your chance to ask questions on cloud native and how it impacts telcos. The question form is right there on the webpage and your questions come straight through to me here in the studio. Now, as part of today's summit, we featured a panel discussion that looked at the essential components of a cloud native strategy for telcos. The panel has been available to watch on demand all day, but if you have not yet seen it, don't worry because we will be broadcasting it immediately after this live show ends.
(01:30):
So don't go away. Keep your browser tab open. We have already received a number of questions from you, but if you haven't yet sent us one, then please do so now using the q and a form on the website. Well, I'm delighted to say that joining me live on the program today are Beth Cohen, SDN Network Product Strategy at Verizon Business Group, Joan Triay manager and Network architect, docomo Euro Labs and Rapporteur of the Etsi, I-S-G-N-F-V, Sidd Chenumolu, who is head of product Management, the software defined edge division at VMware by Broadcom and Michele d'agostino, who is Director of Product Management at Wind River. Hello everyone. Really good to see you all again. Thanks so much for returning for this live show's a real favorite of mine, the live shows. Now let's get straight to our first audience question. And the question is quite simply, is Cloud native the best approach for every telco irrespective of their size and geography? Well, Michele perhaps we can come across to you first for your thoughts on this. Should every telco be looking seriously at cloud native?
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (02:55):
Sure, thank you. So we've been talking in this summit about how cloud native is a powerful approach for telecom, and the question really alludes to the fact whether this is the best fit for each and every telco, which is fair enough. Well, in my view, the whole world is definitely moving to cloud native and it is proven that this aggregation of hardware and software is the way forward. Now, I would distinguish between two scenarios or two types of telcos. On the one hand you get the big and medium telcos, for example, Vodafone, Verizon Telos in Canada that have already started to deploy cloud native networks and are already benefit the benefits of that cloud native brings. On the other hand, maybe initially it is true that it may be difficult for some of those maybe smaller telco operators to move straight away to cloud native, maybe because they have constraints in terms of lack of expertise, maybe because they have very specific regulatory constraints or maybe because they simply don't think that cloud native is mature.
(04:01):
So maybe they'll just have what they call a wait and see strategy. But I really think that eventually they will all move. In fact, there is an interesting study a couple of months ago from Analysis Mason where one of the conclusion was that most of the CSPs would now believe that performance maturity and TCO for cloud native native networks are being taken care of. And now the focus is only on operational aspects. And if I may add, there are some small but advanced CSPs like for example, Elisa in Finland who have already successfully embraced the whole cloud native paradigm and in fact they're very advanced and we have been helping them, for example, with automation as one of their requirements is to have to go to a dark knock. So to conclude, I think that although it must also be said that not all the workloads will move to cloud native, for me the answer is definitely yes and it's just a question of time.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (05:02):
Okay, thanks so much for those comments. So two distinct really groups there and it's all dependent on time and where they are in their journey. I guess Beth, did you want to come in on this question as well?
Beth Cohen, Verizon (05:15):
Yeah, cloud native for some telcos, particularly ones which by the way the larger ones are quite far into the journey, but they also have a huge amount of legacy, particularly on their OSS and BSS systems that make it difficult to get to be cloud native on that business. So it's really a mix. And the newer telcos of course can just dive in. I've always said that when you're starting out, you have a great advantage over the incumbents, which is you have a blank piece of paper in which you can write whatever you want. So you can actually start with a cloud native approach from day one because you don't have that enormous amount of technical debt that you've built up over the years. So yes, the trajectory is to get to be cloud native, but for some telcos, particularly the larger ones, it could take decades.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (06:21):
Great. Thanks so much Beth. As you say, it can take a lot of time this. Joan, did you also want to come in on this first question with your observations?
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (06:32):
Yes, thank you. I fully agree with what that indicated indeed for a big operator, like for example, in our case, it's not so easy to transition from day zero to day one already into the cloud P. And even though I didn't really think about it from a geographical point of view, which was part of the question, I guess that there are also different cultures and different ways of operation of the operators. For example, speaking in my case representing Domos Japanese operator, there are different ways of operation that might not be the same for other operators in Western Europe or in North America. For example. We've been based a lot on workflow based operations that typically is very much associated on following a more imperative way of management, which is not one of the ways that are envisioned for the cloud native ecosystem. So I would say that even though there is potentially no restriction not for any kind of operator, regardless of the size or the geography, we have to understand that there are different cultural backgrounds and different modes of operation. And for that it might happen that for some operators it's more difficult to transition than others.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (08:05):
Yeah, it's interesting Joan, thank you very much for that. And it's an interesting aspect of that question that looking at the geographical differences and as you translate that into cultural differences, that's something to be very aware of. And if any of our viewers are from operators who fall into that category, then please do get in touch with us and send in your views alongside your questions and we'd like to read those out. Okay. Unless we have any other responses to that opening question, should we move on to our next one then? And this second question we have in from our audience asks the question, what are the key factors that are enabled by cloud native environment that contribute to revenue increase for a telco as opposed to cost reductions? We hear a lot about cost savings, but what about new revenue opportunities? Sid, are you able to start us off with some thoughts on this question?
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (09:10):
Yes, sure. Thanks for that. I think revenue I'll call as part of monetization. So I view monetization and modernization as the two sites of the same coin and monetization is really directly related to the top line growth that the company is expecting by developing new products and services. And this really translates to the cloud native nature of the service layer itself. It's not so much about the network, but on the top layer how cloud native which increase the velocity to deliver our change of service is quite important. On the network side, the same layer is integrating on the network side, which it becomes an enabler for such services. So think of it like you want to offer a new service that's going to increase the monetization or increase the top line growth of a company, but it really requires enable underneath it to correspondingly take actions for that particular service or new offering of that kind. So I view it may not play a direct role. A cloud native may say that's going to directly increase the revenue of a company or top line growth, but it is the key enabler. Without that the growth rate would be significantly hampered. That's how we look at it.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (10:28):
That's interesting. Thank you Sidd. So more of a supporting role than as you were saying, an enabling role. Beth, have you got similar thoughts as to the revenue generating impact of Cloud native?
Beth Cohen, Verizon (10:41):
Well, I'm going to go into a somewhat different direction. What I've seen is that the telcos are traditionally kind of slow at rolling out new products because I always say as a telco we need to always deliver very stable products. That's what customers expect. So cloud native can really speed up the time to market for new products, which is something that we really need to concentrate on because I'll use for example, a lot of products that rely on the integration of network and security. Security is becoming a big problem increasingly targets of bad actors. And by using cloud native capabilities we can then drive those new products and those new applications out faster. And so that is where I think cloud native can really help and we can take what we've learned from the website industry and the gaming industry and other industries where they're constantly evolving new products very quickly and apply it to the telco industry in new ways, but yet at the same time maintain our capabilities for delivering very stable products. So it's a little bit of a mix. Yeah, obviously there is some push for reducing costs. So though I would argue we don't see cost reduction as much as was promised, but speed to market is certainly I think paramount.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (12:37):
Great. Thanks Beth. Speed to market. Great. Another kind of supporting or less direct, I guess advantage of cloud native when it comes to revenue. Now I think we've got a couple more views and comments on this one. Michele, did you want to come in as well?
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (12:52):
Yeah, I agree with many of the things that were said already and specifically I would like to build up on the point that Beth made on the time to market. And I think in general this is a very good question because normally the focus is on technology and total cost of ownership, which of course are table stake for telcos. But it is important to look at revenue. So for me, one factor that was discussed earlier is one of the benefits that cloud native brings and that's the agility and innovation. So cloud native architectures of course enable telcos to quickly deploy new services. And for example, I personally see a very big potential for service providers to leverage all the data that they have on the edge of the network to develop in the near future. For example, innovative CCB two x new services. And the beauty of that of cloud native is the fact that let's say that you have 5G CU and DU deployed running on a server on the edge, let's say on Dell or H HP servers, the same resources that are on that server may be used for new revenue generating services.
(14:02):
And because of that, I think it's very critical that all the components within the telco stack are optimized as much as possible and for example, including the cloud platform so that they have the smallest footprint possible.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (14:16):
Great, thanks Michele for those comments. And Joan, did you want to come in as well?
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (14:23):
Yes, actually my example was going to be very much the same that Mikala just explained. There is a great potential by adopting the cloud native solutions to have a unified and common infrastructure that can be used in a span all across all domains of the network. That single infrastructure can really provide to the operator the opportunity to deliver the services wherever they are needed with no restriction of whatever domain they need to be applied. That means that for example, being able to deploy applications at the edge but also in the core, one of the nice use cases for example that might come up in the future that could also be for good new sources of revenue is the capability of the operators of not just only providing networking services and connectivity services but also providing computation services like for example in the forms of in-network computing or in computing network. And that means that by using the same infrastructure, the same platform, I can use it to deliver new kinds of applications that are not just only for connectivity and they're already proof of concept and testing on these domains and they look very promising and it could be a good source of revenue for the future also for the operators.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (16:02):
Great. Well thanks everyone for those responses. Four very interesting answers there to that question. And don't forget, please keep sending in your questions. I'm looking at them right here in front of me in the studio. So please if you've got a question, send one in. Well talking to questions, let's move on to our next viewer question. And this is a question that connects cloud native with 5G. Let me read out this question for you. 5G deployments are progressing worldwide but the pace is not what telco's vendors had counted on and the revenue benefits are lower than what the operators expected. Is it therefore too late for cloud native to make improvements and course corrections in the 5G era? Okay, so our viewers made some assumptions there about maybe vendors not being too happy, operators not being too happy, can cloud native make some positive changes and as they say, course corrections. Beth, I'm sure you'd like to have some comments on this one.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (17:08):
So technology always takes longer than we think to become to become deployed and five GI think was probably overhyped because I've been hearing about 5G and how great it's going to save the world for probably at least five years at this point. Not to knock 5G. 5G is absolutely here, it's absolutely being used but it's not being used in the way we thought it was going to be used because that's always the way new technology comes in. So yes, 5G is going to be deployed, I think we can work on it. I think there are some improvements. I know some of the open source projects O ran, I'll just use this an example, we'll really help push 5G further. I think also there needs to be more understanding of some of the further out use cases. I think the telcos were probably guilty of overhyping 5G and sort of saying, hey the average user will think it's fantastic, they'll be able to watch Korean soap operas and it'll look great. And the actual difference for the average user was not as much as they thought. On the other hand, other use cases are now becoming to the fore that will and are already revolutionizing 5G. So I think we do have an opportunity to course correct and I think we should.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (19:07):
Thanks very much Beth. Well yeah as you alluded to there we are in early stages of 5G. I mean what are we 20, 24, 4, 5 years, we've got a decade plus ahead of 5G in the network. Any more thoughts on this question? Sidd? Are you able to provide some insights as to is there a problem and can the adoption of cloud native help address and correct some of these?
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (19:33):
Yeah, I think I would like to echo some of the points that Beth made. And we also have to realize 5G was the first technology that was a use case driven. If we go back almost like seven, eight years and look at the triangle that ITU had released about IMT 2020, only one use case was for really people. Every other use case was really machine driven, whether it's a D to device to device or device to human or something like that. So again, as be said that it is progressing well. A lot of deployments have happened but one should also realize that 5G is not just a singular technology. There are three things that have happened. One is we have a service-based architecture which was completely new, that was defined by three gpp as Beth said, open ran is the new one and also for the first time telcos adopting the cloud. So three big transformations which are foundational nature are being done as part of 5G. So I can understand why people may think that progress is slow, but it's not the case that telcos globally are adopting these changes and the benefits are slowly going to show up. Right now the focus has been on the consumer side, but as the use cases, many of the POCs that has been alluded to are happening. I really think that the benefits of 5G and connectivity for B2B or B two B2B will really shape up.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (21:00):
Great, thanks very much Sidd. And as you quite rightly pointed out there, there's a number of aspects to 5G. Often think 5G is a bit of an oversimplified abstraction to encompass what's actually going on there. We have other comments, Michele, let's come across to you.
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (21:16):
No, so from my point of view is not too late and although the statement in the question is true, I believe that accelerating the pace is accelerating and we've seen that in for example in the UK where another operator just launched 5G SA. And although it may be true that initial 5G deployments didn't deliver the anticipated revenue that everyone expects every time there is a new g, I believe that cloud native can be really critical to unlock the full potential of 5G and it can definitely help from a revenue perspective. And if I can think about two aspects that can help with that. One is for sure agility and scalability so that the service providers can launch services much faster than before. But the number two is, and probably the most important in my humble opinion is automation, which is enabled by cloud native. And with automation we can reduce operational complexities.
(22:16):
So for example, what we have done with data operations at scale where we've introduced the declarative model to provide upgrades and updates that can basically minimize the impact or the impact of this on service or we can employ the use of AI techniques that are easier to implement in a virtualized run compared to a traditional run. And then you can use that for example, for anomaly detection and resolution. And also something else that we have done recently is employing gen ai, which I know is new and there is a lot of hype around it but you can use or we've been using large language models in order to look at real time issues and resolve them through natural language user interactions in order to troubleshoot issues. And why is this important? It is important because by increasing the quality of experience in the network you are automatically minimizing churn in the network, churn from customers and therefore you attract new customers and this is a way to increase revenue in my opinion.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (23:29):
Fantastic, thanks very much. And Beth, let's go straight back to you for some additional comments.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (23:36):
Yeah, I wanted to talk a little bit about one of the 5G technologies that was hyped very early, which is network slicing. And not to say that network slicing isn't still coming, it is, but it has definitely lagged in terms of deployments and I think when it does come, which will be in the next couple of years, I think that will really make 5G far more useful for many use cases so that we can better manage the network and shape the traffic so that we can have some applications in some users have better performance for their applications. One of the things I think we forget about 5G is that the use cases are really focused on applications and I think that's kind of gotten forgotten in the shuffle and over the next couple years am hoping to see that swing back, that pendulum swing back as we deploy network slicing out within the 5G framework.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (24:53):
Okay, thanks very much Beth. We will keep our eyes open and watch out for that. And as you say, it's hard, it's hard to predict these use cases in advance and also the timings and when they're all going to take off. Okay, I think we have addressed that question very nicely. It's time now though to check in on our audience poll for the cloud native telco summit and as always we ask our audience a related question and give a selection of multiple choice answer options. Well the question we are asking you this week is cloud native can deliver substantial benefits to telcos but what are the main challenges to its adoption? And you can see the real time results appearing right here over on my right shoulder there early days on the poll, we've still got to open a few more days, it's quite spread out. What's this maturity of cloud native software from vendors is ranking quite highly and I know we addressed that on a future panel in this year's summit. Good to see difficulties in recruiting or hiring talent currently ranking low as a positive. Well look, if you've yet to vote, please do so. You can influence the results here. The more votes we get, the better it is. We will take another look at the voting during tomorrow's live q and a show.
(26:21):
We still have time for more questions of course. And let's get straight onto our next one. And let me read out the question the questioner asks, I am surprised to learn from the earlier panel today that day two support is weak. Can you elaborate on the reasons here and what vendors can do to help? Okay, well there's a question directly related to today's panel and Beth, I am pretty sure you brought up the subject of day two during that discussion. So perhaps we can come to you first for some thoughts and if you can elaborate and explain what you mean and how vendors can help.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (27:06):
I did indeed bring that up as a telco operator and I'm in the product side of the house, I am very well aware of what it takes to do day two. In fact our ROI comes out of how efficient we can run day twos. So I think it's important for us to focus on that. And cloud native doesn't really address most of day two issues because day two issues are focused on process and efficiency of process and it relies on, and I mentioned this earlier in this call, BSS and OSS systems that the vendors have not particularly focused on making the BSS and OSS systems cloud native particularly. So I think that's where the vendors can really help. Those systems tend to lag from a technology perspective. They're bread and butter, the billing systems, the ticketing systems, the systems that keep everything alive and reporting systems.
(28:24):
And I think that there can be a focus on improving those systems and making them more efficient and more match better with the technology that we're doing on the network side to make everything cloud native. And I think there is a real opportunity for better integration of those systems to show that they can, everything can be cloud native, which gives us the flexibility to change things on the fly. And again, referring back to my earlier comment about flexibility and time to market as a person who launches new products frequently, probably 70% of the issues we run into launching new products has to do with the backend systems and not the actual products that we launch. Those are pretty straightforward, but integrating with our backend systems, figuring out how to bill, how to support them, that's where we run into the issues.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (29:33):
Great, thanks very much for elaborating there. Beth and Joan, I think you've got some comments here and we, we've talked on the summit in previous years about day zero, day one, quite a lot, but day two is now coming up this year. What are your thoughts? Is there an issue here and what can we do to help?
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (29:54):
Indeed? I think that maybe this is just also my perception that there is a little bit of too much focus on the day zero and day one. So solutions, proof of concepts, trying to see something that is being deployed and works, but this is not the end of the story. The operators, we are a lot more concerned actually on the day two and the long-term support. So we should focus more on that. And coming back to the question about how the vendors could potentially help on this, for instance, one of the efforts that we are spending nowadays a lot is on defining services provided by the platform that precisely focus on these data kind of functionalities like upgrades, configurations, traffic management and so on and so forth. And one of the good ways that probably the vendors could help is on trying to accommodate to the standards and the open source solutions that are being delivered in this domain and try to help and develop them.
(31:08):
More importantly is to make sure that once these implementations are accommodating to the standards in some way so that we can really integrate them with our OSS and BSS systems and the higher layer orchestration systems that we have otherwise, then of course we might fall into the trap of again getting some kind of silos. So in the end I would say that yes, there is a little bit of two rush on trying to get something to work, but more importantly is to make it work for a long term helping on these kind of functionalities from the very start in the standards and the open source that could be a win-win solution for both the operators and the vendors I believe.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (31:58):
Great. Thanks very much for those comments. Joan. Michele, let's come across to you as well for your comments on the day two issues.
Michele D'Agostino, Wind River (32:09):
Yes, thank you. So during the panel I also provided my view from a vendor perspective and from a cloud perspective on data. I think what I said is that for telco deployments, for cloud native deployments to be successful, you will need to define cloud native platforms and solutions which deliver operations at scale, which include the full lifecycle including data, which is actually the most important step in the lifecycle as CSPs make regular updates and upgrades to their network. And you need to be able to deploy these software and to do these upgrades on tens of thousands of nodes simultaneously. So at the same time, and in my view or in my experience to achieve this, it is definitely important to augment the basic capabilities that Kubernetes provides with zero touch deployment at scale. And I can say that although of course more work is still required than as Beth was saying, we have done a lot of work to have a solution for data automation and we are actually very fortunate that we have had the benefit of being deployed at scale with our V run cloudified solution at Verizon. And this has definitely helped us to leverage our learning, not on paper, but in the field with a very demanding network to introduce already a high level of automation for day two for tens of thousands of nodes. So my view is that there is actually already great support for day two and there are solutions to perform fast and predictable upgrades while you also provide observability and analytics. Of course there is more work to do, but I think there's a big focus already on data.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (34:01):
Thanks very much Michele and Sidd, let's come across to you for your thoughts on this because you also referred to, you were talking about the data issues during our earlier panel.
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (34:11):
Yeah, so I think the previous comments were quite spot on, but just to add to that, there are two things I would call out that. One is in the day two, if not automation is one part of it, but more importantly one has to make sure that they have a deep observability on what's happening when a day two operation happens, whether it's an upgrade, update, any changes to the network, it's quite important for an operator to know exactly how the changes are being implemented and how to roll them back if things are not working properly. So I said they do run critical services in addition to that. The question itself as to how the vendors can help, I think one way could be that the vendors can bring in teams for transformation customer success, who can work with the operators to help them define the new processes that are really needed for transformation in the cloud native environment. This is fairly new to many operators and we work with dozens of operators globally on that and customers are quite appreciative of that. So customer success, this transformation processes, even the professional services that we offer, it's absolutely critical. The people who are offering services are also completely understand what cloud native is and advise the operators properly. Many times we have seen that the tech product might be cloud native, but the supporting service systems teams are not exactly on par to take the full benefit of that. So it has to come like a full package.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (35:44):
Great. The full package. Thank you very much Sidd for those additional comments. Thanks everyone for the comments on that question. And don't forget if you haven't seen it already, have a look at the panel we have for you today where we're go into more detail there, right? We've got time for at least one more question if not two. Here's another question we received a short time ago. Okay, the questions more for Kai at Deutsche Telekom who was enabled to join us for this live show, but we'll read out the question anyway. The Deutsche telekom speaker alluded to the hope that cloud native could remove the need for another major investment cycle and architecture upheaval that is surely due to come with six G is cloud native really in a position to perhaps lead a radical new change and approach. It was an interesting point made on that panel as to whether or not cloud native might be a catalyst for changing the way we go about the historic tenure cycles with cellular. Sidd, do you mind if I come across to you and get your thoughts on this first?
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (36:55):
Well, I'll be first to admit I don't exactly know what 60 G is and what's going to look like. It's like we are rewinding our clock going to the 5G and predicting what the 5G should look like 10 years from now. And we know for a fact that we just discussed, we are not completely right, but I think one difference is that six G, 5G, seven G, whatever GS may come later are standards driven. The cloud native is not just for telcos, cloud native is an ecosystem ecosystem that is defined not for just for telco but for enterprises IT and much more. And it's really an industry driven, ecosystem driven, in this case Linux foundations against cf. So what really means is that they're both running on parallel tracks at a different velocity. One is driven by standards with a long-term view and where we know exactly what we're going to get in long-term.
(37:56):
But on the cloud native side it's really driven by the contributors to the ecosystem and depending on the uptick of each features and functionality really defines where cloud-native or something like that would go forward. The exact interception is what we are trying to make it happen. We're trying to take the benefit of the surety of a standards driven by three GPP or an et cetera and multiplying that with the cloud native velocity to get the best for the operators. Now Cloud native really gives the abstraction. The abstraction is on the hardware side, abstractions for the software so that both software and the can also have their own velocity. I do think that cloud native will be the mainstay for next few years, whether it's community 60 or not, I can't say for sure, but definitely for next few years, cloud native will be the way to deploy new applications and whether we discussed about ai, if AI is here to stay, then definitely cloud native becomes the basics to enable AI there.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (39:04):
Very interesting. Thank you very much for that Sidd. We've got some additional comments as well. So Joan, let me come across to you first for your thoughts about whether or not cloud native can be a catalyst to lead a new change and a new approach to how we introduce new standards and technology.
Joan Triay, Docomo Euro-Labs (39:24):
I would say that definitely yes. In the same way that also NFP started the same journey I would say with the transformation with the digital transformation of the operators, I many times referred that even though we know that we have not taken the full benefits yet of the 5G, I would say that the 5G was always defined in a way that it was already an native companies and operators. We knew the capabilities of disaggregation of our networks, decoupling of the software from the infrastructure and that opened up a new breadth of new opportunities on how to actually redefine our networks. So in many ways I already explained in some of the conferences and events that the 5G was already in n ft native and the same will happen with the CX G. I believe that the cloud native and the NFE technologies and concepts are real catalyst for the definition of the network.
(40:29):
And the good thing is that I believe that with these concepts by using Cloud native and NFE technologies operators will be able to manage in the future more smooth transitions of our networks. It might happen actually precisely that these 10 year cycles kind of get shortened or actually get kind of diffused because the network will evolve potentially in a more gradual way thanks to the enablers that all these cloud native ecosystem can provide. So indeed I believe that with the cloud native there can be potential for the future for the operators to have smoother transitions without having to think about so much radical changes. There will be radical changes I believe in terms of offering of services and applications, but those all will be just delivered by software. There will not be a major appeal on how to change our network in a sense since everything will be just treated as software as an application that can be deployed. And I made before just the example of the in network computing use cases, we are going to precisely and very potentially use the same infrastructure, the same platform that we deliver and we deploy our network functions for deploying any other kind of applications. And who knows, maybe those applications also become part of how we define the six G in the future. The good thing is that, as I said, because of using these technologies that cloud native and NV provides, there will not be a measure impact for the operator to deploy them and operator.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (42:26):
Interesting. Thanks very much Joan, for those comments. I think there's a lot of operators who would like to see a more granular evolution I think would help in many ways. Beth, what do you think? What are your views here?
Beth Cohen, Verizon (42:40):
I want to take it off in a little bit of a different direction because I'm seeing standards and open source need to work together more than they are today. I think there's been some convergence, but I think that needs to be continued convergence and that will really drive forward the cloud native capabilities in the longterm because cloud native really is a lot of open source of course with OpenStack and Kubernetes and all these other, Anique is another one that are coming from the software and technology perspective. And yet at the same time we have O ran and we have other standards coming through math and the API standards and I think they really need to converge to really take everything the cloud native technology forward so that it can be deployed in the way that Joanne was talking about, that we can speed the trajectory of incorporating new technologies and new products into our system, into the telco systems.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (44:02):
Great. Thanks very much Beth. And thanks everyone. Okay. I'm just checking our systems here and I think looking at the time, we've got time for one more question and we've got one that's just come in whilst you were speaking there, Beth. So apologies if I stumble over this one. I'm reading out directly. As I say, it's just come in, it's worth bringing to everyone. So the question asks, the panel topic today was the essential components for cloud native, I guess their company. We are being advised to start an AI transformation program and to integrate this with our preexisting cloud native work is this best practice. Okay, so is this from a telco, anonymous telco, should telcos integrate their potential AI work and AI network transformation work with their cloud native work? Are these two things that should be happening in parallel combined or should they be treated separately? Do we have any comments or anyone offering some help to our viewer there as to about whether that's a best practice or a viable alternative or any other ways of going about introducing AI and cloud native? Do you have any takers, anyone who wants to help out and just here? Oh dear. Well, this could be the, oh, Beth, thank you very much, Beth, you've got some comments to kick us off. Our viewer will be delighted please.
Beth Cohen, Verizon (45:37):
Other people will, I'm sure kick in, but AI is, I don't have to say it maximum hype right now. Not to say that AI and as machine learning, which I think is more important in the telco world isn't very important, but it's also still at the beginnings is cloud native and AI related only in the sense that cloud native allows us to do the massive amount of computations that are needed on the large language models and maintaining the giant databases that really run our AI systems behind the scenes. So absolutely it does help. Are they intimately related? In my opinion? Probably not, but we're on the beginnings of the AI journey. So where we are in five years will be completely different.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (46:48):
That is one absolute certainty. You're absolutely right. Thanks very much indeed for addressing that one for us. Beth and Sidd, you are going to come in with some extra comments as well, please.
Sidd Chenumolu, VMware (46:59):
Yeah, I think quite an interesting question, right? I mean everyone's talking about AI nowadays. So the way I describe this AI is well scaling application in this case a model that runs on a workflow infrastructure at scale. So again, cloud native implementation is, think of it like an enabler for ai, but between the AI application on the top and the cloud native implementation, there's an aspect of data platform which is equally important and that is the one that ties to the cloud native aspect of it and also to the AI application, the data, what data gets collected and at what velocity is quite important for AI to work. Whether it's a predictive AI or I don't know what the application the person was asking question was intending to run, but let's assume it's a predictive ai. It really depends on what level of information that underlying infrastructure application is able to provide to the data model for the generative part to take action for rack. So cloud native does enable that. So think of it like again, cloud native allows AI to work smoothly, but again, there's a degree of separation between those two.
Guy Daniels, TelecomTV (48:10):
Fantastic. Thanks so much for coming on this one, Sidd, that's so much appreciated. Well, I do believe we are at the end of our show for this first day of the cloud native summit. We are out of time. Thank you so much to all of you who joined us for this live program. And do remember to send in your questions for tomorrow's live q and a show as soon as you can. Don't leave it too late. We've got a couple of questions just coming in right now. It's too late. We'll have to use 'em for tomorrow show. So please, as sooner the better. And also please do take part in the poll. There is still plenty of time for you to have your say. Well, you can find the full agenda for day two of the summit on the telecom TV website. We have a panel discussion on identifying new roles and developing new skills for cloud native telcos and we focus on a few emerging areas. Plus my colleague Rayla Matra speaks with BT about the increasing importance of the DevSecOps role. And if you don't know what that is, then please tune in to find out more. And remember, you can watch both of these programs on demand from tomorrow morning. And in case you missed today's panel discussion as mentioned earlier, we are going to broadcast it right now as soon as this program ends. We'll be back tomorrow with our second live q and A show, same time, same place. Until then, thanks for watching and goodbye.
Please note that video transcripts are provided for reference only – content may vary from the published video or contain inaccuracies.
Live Q&A discussion
This live Q&A show was broadcast at the end of day one of The Cloud Native Telco Summit. TelecomTV’s Guy Daniels was joined by industry guest panellists for this question and answer session. Among the questions raised by our audience were:
- Is cloud native the best approach for every telco, irrespective of their size and geography?
- What are the key factors that are enabled by a cloud-native environment that contribute to revenue increases for a telco as opposed to cost reductions?
- Is it too late for cloud native to make improvements in the 5G era?
- Why is day-two support weak? Can you elaborate on the reasons and what vendors can do to help?
- Cloud native could remove the need for another major investment cycle and architecture upheaval that is surely due to come with 6G. Is cloud native really in a position to, perhaps, lead a radical new change and approach?
- Should telcos integrate their potential AI work and AI network transformation work with their cloud-native work? Are these two things that should be happening in parallel or should they be treated separately?
Speakers
Beth Cohen
SDN Network Product Strategy, Verizon Business Group
Dr. Joan Triay
Manager and Network Architect, DOCOMO Communications Lab. Europe (DOCOMO Euro-Labs), Rapporteur, ETSI ISG NFV
Michele D’Agostino
Director of Product Management, Wind River
Sidd Chenumolu
Head of Product Management, Software-Defined Edge Division, VMware by Broadcom
