Transport SDN in ECOC'2013

1. SDN in Transport/IP
Networks?!
Ping Pan, Ph.D.
September 2013

2. The Paradigm Shift:
the separation of control-plane and data-plane
Applications and Services
Physical Storage
Physical Processors
Physical Networks
Physical Storage
Physical Processors
Physical Networks
Physical Storage
Physical Processors
Physical Networks
Physical Storage
Physical Processors
Physical NetworksPhysical Networks
Virtualized Networks
OR… IS THIS FOR REAL?

3.  Can make network BIGGER…
 Can make service deployment FASTER…
 Can make network operation SIMPLER…
 Can virtualize network devices and make them CHEAPER
 Incumbent: my SDN is BETTER than yours!
Confusion… over Transport SDN

4. Bigger? Optical transport networks can get bigger
without SDN
Fact: Wavelength demand has increased 500% since 2004, while revenue growth is far less
Claim #1: SDN is about scaling up networks (packet, optical, enterprise, data center and
backbone) as a whole. Considering optical transport network SDN in isolation makes no
sense!

5. Faster? Existing network architecture is the bottleneck
for slow service deployment
Claim #2: Sorting out inter-networking interfaces as “NNI’s” makes no sense. We need to
virtualize the network as a whole, and run IP services in an Over-The-Top (OTT) manner

6. Simpler? Don’t look for standard bodies to help you
 IETF:
• The routing infrastructure is
getting more complex each
everyday
 ITU:
• OTU/ODU is not for dummies
neither
 ONF:
• Multi-tables in OpenFlow…
really?
Claim #3: We are not making networking simpler through standard bodies

7.  Virtualization in storage and computing:
• Definition: Take commodity x86 servers, represent them as uniform resources,
and utilize them for efficiency
• Goal: efficiency in utilization
• Means: commodity hardware
 Reality in networking:
• High-performance networking ASIC’s are all different in behavior and properties
• Transport gears don’t need to inter-op (including date encoding) to get deployed
in Tier1 networks
• The driver behind transport efficiency is in packing advanced functions and
features, and has little to do with commodity hardware
Claim #4: Virtualizing of network components makes no sense. The name of the
game is in virtualizing the networks in terms of throughput, delay and protection
capability, and provide programming interfaces.
What does VIRTUALIZATION mean?

8. Incumbent’s Notion of SDN:
…make sure it’s called OpenXYZ
Router Networks
SDN
OpenFlow? Why stop
there? Add more
Claim #5: Router vendors think the router networks are not complex,
slow and expensive! 

9. Why cannot we do this?
Vendor
X
Vendor
X
Vendor
X
L2
Switch
Vendor
Y
Vendor
Y
Vendor
Y
Metro DC Metro DCLong-Haul
Controller
Application

10. 10GigE
10GigE
Physical Network

11. 10GigE
10GigE
Virtualized Network
Via simple interfaces
A
B
C
D

12. Virtualized Network
by Application
-- backend load balancer
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
P8

13. 10GigE
10GigE
Controller
A
B
C
D
(ABCD,
P1, P7, BW)
P1  P7
Application
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
P8

14. 10GigE
10GigE
Controller
A
B
C
D
(ABCD,
P1, P7, BW)
P1  P7
Load
Balancer
Data Center
App’s
VM distribution
P1
P2
P3
P4
P5
P6
P7
P8

15.  What if…
• We scale up the transport network
 What if…
• We virtualize the network as whole
• We run IP services on top
 What if…
• We make the IP services 1/10 of the existing price, and sell
to 10x of the customers
 Claim #6: It’s not What-If. It’s WHEN
The Last Claim for the Day