Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (00:05):
Autonomous networks promise to revolutionize how CSPs operate, but the path to full autonomy varies dramatically across regions and operators. In this first instalment of the future is Autonomous Nokia's zero Touch Network Revolution. We explore how different markets are approaching autonomous network strategies and the critical balance between automation and human oversight. Joining me today is Vishal Singh, senior VP of Global Business, Cloud and Network Services at Nokia. Vishal, thank you for being here today.

Vishal Singh, Nokia (00:39):
Thanks a lot, Clarence. Pleasure is mine.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (00:42):
So Vishal, what is Nokia's vision for autonomous networks and how does it align with the evolving needs of CSPs?

Vishal Singh, Nokia (00:51):
Great question and thanks for the opportunity. The vision for Nokia's vision on autonomous network is actually I would say quite straightforward. We want our customers to have self-managing, self-optimizing, self-healing networks across domains, radio, core transport and any cloud and among in a multi-vendor environment. That's our vision and we've been on this journey in terms of building onto our vision for quite some time actually, and we were the early, I would say, adapters of this idea of going down the path of extreme automation, which was, I would say a precursor to autonomous network. We went exploring this space quite some time back because of our natural software capability that the organization had a multi-vendor software capability, and that allowed us to explore this idea. And then fast track 20 21, 20 22, we started exploring what machine learning had to offer, what artificial intelligence had to offer. And then when we are today where we are with generative ai, the possibilities looks unlimited as to what we can do and how we can influence this.

(02:05):
Obviously, we adapt the TMF level one to level five, the maturity model in terms of helping our customers understand where they are today and what it'll take for them to get to where they need to get to, which is to level four or five, which is at level five, is full autonomy. And we do that fundamentally from an end-to-end perspective. We believe that autonomous network is built around three fundamental pillars. Number one of that is security, because you need to have networks designed or secure by design and before you actually start on the journey of autonomous network. Then also you need to understand what's happening in the network from understanding the network itself, understanding the services on top of the network and understanding the experience that we are delivering to our consumer and enterprises. So then once we know what's going on in the network is when we can go full or we can actually apply automation or extreme automation to deliver closed loop capabilities on the network and therefore go hands-free if I may say so. Security analytics and extreme automation are the critical fundamental building blocks or the pillars of delivering autonomous network from a Nokia's architectural design point perspective to help our customers get to the, what do you call and self-healing networks across domain, across multi-vendor architecture or multi-vendor landscape.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (03:38):
How does Nokia address integration challenges in multi-domain, multi-vendor environment?

Vishal Singh, Nokia (03:45):
Great question, Clarence. The fundamental aspect of doing anything of this nature when you're looking at multi-domain, where you have radio core transport and any cloud infrastructure is to make it work across the board. No customer of ours actually is going to have a single domain environment for that matter, and therefore our software fundamentally looks at end-to-end view of a multi-domain architecture as well as multi-vendor. Now, these are very critical. We as a software business has been actually conceived with an idea that anything that we do has to be done with an idea of cross-domain and a multi-vendor and an infrastructure agnostic architecture. How do we do that? We do that by actually investing way ahead of our time into cloud native architecture. We have been on this journey of building cloud-native software from day one. Our design point was to go cloud native from day one, and we've been on this journey for some time now.

(04:47):
Fast forward in today's world where you have Kubernetes as the cornerstone of everything that we are doing in the cloud native world with microservices, the ability to do cross domain and to do multi-vendor is becoming easier. Now, yes, all this has to be done with an idea of 3G PPP standard because telecom industry to deliver a five, nine highly resilient network demands adherence to certain standards. Those standards do help us as our vendor ecosystem does confirm to that standard and underlying technology architecture reliant on Kubernetes, for example, and the ability to drive automation with that technology at the core of it is super important for us, and that's what we leverage. The other fundamental shift that has happened in this industry is the advent of cloud itself. Cloud has been a big enabler to us to help us drive that cross domain multi-vendor architecture deployment. So cloud Kubernetes, microservices, these have been the fundamental building blocks and on top of that, the 3G PPP standards and our industries, what do you call compliance to that standard has helped us a lot and it's an ecosystem play. We work with our industry partners very closely. We have several projects across the world where we have multi-vendor ecosystem where we deliver our software. I would say pretty successfully, actually very, very successfully across these cross domain multi-vendor environments.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (06:22):
So Vishal, how does Nokia prioritize security in autonomous networks, particularly with the unique challenges of 5G

Vishal Singh, Nokia (06:31):
Clarence, security is now the central theme of almost all conversations we are having with our customers across the world. You cannot go autonomous without actually making sure that the network is secure by design. And when you look at 5G, 5G, which is actually a low latency, high speed network, built on fundamentally cloud principles with a very high degree of automation expectation to get the benefits of 5G, there is no way but to build the network secure by design. So we have weaved our security capability into not only our products that we take to the market, but also as a design point for autonomous network. As I mentioned earlier, the cornerstone of our architecture is built around security. Security for us is endpoint detection capability, our network detection capability, as well as extended detection and response capability. We have got product across these three domains to make sure that we are securing the 5G critical infrastructure from an end-to-end perspective in terms of who's going to access the network, what's going on in the end devices at the end point, what's happening, the network in the traffic, in the session, as well as what's happening across the landscape of that network, the network infrastructure itself, including cloud infrastructure.

(07:58):
So that has been our design point from day one, and therefore we always say that autonomous network is built with security as the founding architectural building block on top of it. Analytics plays a very important role because you need to know what's happening in the network, as I said earlier, and then only you can go extreme automation and close loop automation. So I hope this helps Clarence in explaining security is a very big part of our architecture, our design point.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (08:27):
It absolutely does, but how do you balance full network autonomy with the necessary human oversight in critical situations?

Vishal Singh, Nokia (08:36):
We strongly believe that there are a lot of repetitive task, and this network obviously is always on correct. You expect the networks to be alive and kicking whenever you pick up your phone, you want your data to work, you want your voice calls to go, you want your text messaging to work. Therefore, this network is 24 by seven always on. To have this network always on. There is a lot that goes on. There's a lot of activities that goes on. There's a huge opportunity to automate almost everything, if I may say, to deliver that zero touch experience and zero trust experience, and therefore you have to look at how humans actually do more strategic aspects of that network management or network optimization or network operations instead of actually going into the activity. So there is an opportunity for human element to look at strategic aspects of the network management, network operations, network efficiency, while leaving the activities which are, I would say done over and over again, including some of the actions that must be done based on certain playbooks onto the machine in that sense. So humans actually operating more at a strategic level, more at a decision making level while thousands of repetitive actions which actually make this network work day in, day out, 24 by seven is left to autonomous capabilities or making or giving the network the autonomy in that sense.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (10:16):
What are the key technologies that enable greater autonomy in CSP networks?

Vishal Singh, Nokia (10:22):
There are a couple of fundamental building blocks. I would say cloud as number one, cloudification, extreme cloudification of the network is ongoing and based on the cloudification disaggregation is happening as well. Therefore, that's the fundamental building block. The other element of that building block is Kubernetes and microservices architecture, which actually helps us to become cloud native. So being cloud native is the essential element in making sure that we are able to deliver an highly automated or highly autonomous network, if I may say, and to get to autonomous network. The other building block is security and security across the world from access all the way to extended detection and response and very high degree of visibility and observability into the network that comes along with it.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (11:15):
So what is the biggest regional gap between CSP ambition and autonomous network maturity in Europe?

Vishal Singh, Nokia (11:23):
Europe recently, I think there was a recent TMF survey which showed that 72% of European operators are taking, I would call it a cautious approach towards going full autonomous while 28% are looking to go more, I would say bold and brave, which means looking at TMF maturity model from level one to five, and how do you get to either four or five? Most of our customers globally are at about 1.5 to two. In TMF maturity model in Europe is the same scenario, but as I said, a lot of European operators are more cautious. Why are they so cautious? Fundamentally because of regulatory reasons. Their, I would say legacy infrastructure, the complexity of that infrastructure, their ability to go cloud native faster and sooner because being cloud native is the underlying, I would say, hygiene before you actually can go full autonomous all the way to level four and five of the maturity model.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (12:28):
Vishal. What current projects demonstrate Nokia's progress toward fully autonomous networks?

Vishal Singh, Nokia (12:35):
We're engaged with, as you can imagine, almost all tier one providers across the world. Areas where we are doing some exceptional work is slice orchestration, for example, across customers in United States, in Middle Eastern Africa, as well as in Europe. We are also looking to drive end-to-end autonomous network capabilities in some of the customers in Europe, for example, as well as in Asia Pacific. Our customers are really looking at how we help them in this journey of autonomous network through different starting points because different customers have different starting point and we actually meet them there. So some customers are looking at how they can actually visualize their network, drive observability, extreme observability, and therefore start acting on some of the closed loop aspects of the network. Some of the customers are looking at how we can help them understanding the data better. So we are working with one of the large operators in US as well as in Europe, to help them understand what they can get out of data and drive the knowledge of the network to drive automation on top of it.

(13:43):
So therefore, several customers, several examples, most of them are tier one operators in Europe, for example, with one of the large groups. We are also doing work around AI/ML Ops in particular to help them actually make drive efficiency on automation in their operations. In the network too, I would say sometimes challenge to just name the customers because of the approvals in terms of being referenceable. But Nokia as a company and our customer base is extensive. We work with almost all large tier one as well as tier two, tier three telcos around the world and most of our customers are really looking to drive automation and with generative AI the is now. So you can imagine the discussions are happening everywhere across the board.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (14:34):
Vishal, thank you very much for sharing your insights today.

Vishal Singh, Nokia (14:39):
No, really appreciate the time, Clarence, it's my pleasure and a great opportunity for us to share some of the great work we are doing. So thank you very, very much and you have a great day.

Clarence Reynolds, TelecomTV (14:50):
Join us again to discover how autonomous networks are becoming the foundation for tomorrow's digital ecosystem and please see the resources below for further information. Thank you.