Ericsson and Telefonica have announced that they will continue working together to transform the operator's global networks, extending an agreement originally made in 2013.
According to the two firms, the focus of the partnership is on network transformation, including finishing an ongoing network virtualization total cost of ownership (TCO) study, and the two companies will also jointly work on an NFV roadmap that will prepare the first migration steps.
These steps include the set-up of a multi-vendor cloud environment to test Ericsson virtualized network functions (VNFs) on top of a cloud infrastructure, including the possibility of using Ericsson VNF Orchestrator.
A key long-term ambition for both companies is also to work together on the operational model definition for virtualization in telecommunications, IT and B2B.
Enrique Blanco, global CTO for Telefonica, said, “The co-operation that we entered into with Ericsson in 2013 has been very fruitful, and we are excited to continue the great work we have done together and begin to implement some of our findings. At Telefonica, we are convinced that network virtualization will help to improve TCO efficiency and improve our service agility.”
Ericsson and Telefonica signed a memorandum of understanding in 2013 to launch a joint R&D program to explore and understand the challenges and opportunities in network virtualization during the coming decade.
Two areas of particular interest were network functions virtualization (NFV) and service provider software defined networking (SDN). At the center of this initiative is the need to build more flexible and cost-efficient solutions, as well as to enable networks as true platforms for innovation.
The program agreed in 2013 has been successfully executed during the past year, with quality deliverables achieved in different categories: the joint study report, a joint industry contribution and successfully-executed proof of concept (POC) including Ericsson Cloud Execution Environment, Ericsson Cloud Manager and virtualized network functions like virtual Evolved Packet Core and virtual Charging System.
As well as Ericsson, Telefonica also partnered with Alcatel-Lucent to demo LTE video streaming and video calling services over an end to end virtualized network at Mobile World Congress early this month.