Analysys Mason features Kerlink in reports on IoT network functions virtualization (NFV) and software-defined networking (SDN)
The firm’s interviews with Kerlink’s Chief Marketing Officer Stéphane Dejean support its research and analysis of NFV and SDN and low-power wide-area IoT networks. NFV is a network architecture concept that uses the technologies of IT virtualization to virtualize entire classes of network node functions into building blocks that may connect, or chain together, to create communication services.1.
SDN is related to NFV, but it refers to a different domain. It is an approach to build data networking equipment and software that separates and abstracts elements of these systems. It does this by decoupling the control plane and data plane from each other, such that the control plane resides centrally and the forwarding components remain distributed.2.
The two strategy reports are:
“NFV-enabled IoT networks: opportunities and threats for operators”
In its summary of this first report, Analysis Mason wrote:
“Operators need to evaluate the implications of the emergence of new entrants with LPWA networks based on NFV/SDN and how that will impact their own ambitions in IoT.”
“NFV-enabled IoT networks: opportunities and threats for vendors”
This report notes:
“The adoption of NFV/SDN for LPWA networks will have the twin effect of expanding the target market for new-entrant LPWA network technology vendors and driving the take-up of LPWA networks by enterprise customers.”
“Network virtualisation is accelerating the entry of new IoT technology vendors with innovative solutions and operators that can exploit them. This is expanding the availability of interesting LPWA network solutions which threaten established vendors and operators with higher cost and lower agility products and services.”
After the reports were made available to Analysis Mason subscribers and other customers, Dejean noted that Kerlink is accelerating its evolution in the IoT value chain with its own LoRaWANTM virtualized network server and full set of network and operation-management tools, the WanesyTM Management Centre.
“This comprehensive solution allows orchestration and provisioning of LoRaWAN networks, potentially leveraging not only Kerlink’s market-leading gateways, but also third-party gateways, to grant openness and interoperability, one of the key strengths of our value proposal,” he said. “Kerlink’s virtualized network can be run in a public cloud, using AWS in the Americas, Europe, APAC and other key markets, or it can be specifically hosted on a private cloud. This flexibility is key to equipping enterprise clients with private Kerlink-based LoRaWAN networks to unlock the promising market of private networks throughout segments like smart cities, industry 4.0 and asset management.”
1.https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Network_function_virtualization
2.Ibid