Co-written by Bryan Mobley, Director, IBSG Service Provider
The business world’s rise to the cloud has been dramatic and increasingly rapid. From an initial attitude of vague interest mixed with trepidation, organizations have begun to embrace the transition in a big way. Some are already realizing the expansive benefits in costs, efficiency, and innovation that come with this game-changing technology.
To keep with the pulse of cloud migration, Cisco initiated a series of roundtable discussions two years ago. The philosophy of each meeting was to bring together 10 to 20 decision makers from a variety of enterprises, midsized businesses, and government agencies. So far, we’ve held 15 of these discussions across North America. In addition to providing a unique opportunity to share our thought leadership, these sessions provide an ideal forum for hearing our customers’ thoughts on cloud: the benefits, the inhibitors, and even a few war stories. In the end, however, it is the advantages of cloud that spark the most contagious conversations.
Here are some of the key trends that have emerged from two years of discussions:
The Visual Networking Index predicts we’re going to hit nearly a zettabyte of traffic by 2015. Applications such as video and cloud services are consuming bandwidth on the network to the point that 10 Gbps infrastructure is insufficient. Without question, 100 Gbps technology in the data center, network core and edge, and transport is a key enabler to remove bandwidth constraints. Cisco is leading the industry in 100Gbps technology across network architecture, and two major acquisitions recently in the 100 Gbps optical component space drive innovation, reduce costs, and improve performance for our customers.
The first acquisition was CoreOptics, a Digital Signal Processing solution designer which was completed in 2010. CoreOptics provides silicon technology to deliver 100 Gbps coherent optical signals on existing (10 Gbps) fiber infrastructure. This means customers can upgrade to 100 Gbps and beyond without incurring tremendous costs. They can do this regardless if their existing fiber network is Cisco, Alcatel, or Nortel/Ciena. It’s the best 100Gbps DWDM solution in the industry with ultra long haul distances (up to 3000 km, as validated by EANTC) and highest density (3x the competition). Even better, we’ve already shown that it’s capable of taking transmission to 400 Gbps and 1 Tbps super-channels in the future.
The second acquisition, Lightwire, is a silicon photonics company with technology to enable cost-effective, very high-speed optical interconnects using CMOS-based silicon photonic optical transceivers. In non-technical terms, “CMOS” (Complementary Metal-Oxide-Semiconductor) is the industry standard for manufacturing chips without need for exotic materials or processes. This means lower power consumption, higher densities, and lower costs, all of which are critical to reducing the operational cost and carbon footprint of data centers as they scale to 100 Gbps and beyond. With this technology in-house, the advanced silicon optical technology can be utilized across our entire product portfolio.
Our customers are very positive. We’ve announced a number of successful trials in our long-haul DWDM solution, including US Signal, Lumos, and SURFnet. Look for more to be coming soon!
Last week the UN’s Broadband Commission held its fifth meeting to discuss how to extend the broadband Internet to the almost six billion people on the planet who have yet to connect at broadband speeds. A critical component to extending the Internet is the work done by the multi-stakeholder technical community, especially the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).
From March 25th through the 30th, the IETF held its 83rd meeting and Cisco was honored to be the host sponsor. Over fourteen hundred attendees, from 56 countries, participated in the meeting which gathered a large open multi-stakeholder community of network designers, engineers, operators, vendors, and researchers concerned with the evolution and smooth operation of the Internet. Technologies previously defined by the IETF, such as IPv6 and DNSSEC, are now at the forefront of efforts to ensure the Internet’s continued growth as a trusted platform of communications and innovation for billions of people around the world. As a result, the Internet has now grown to be essential to the 21st century global economy and a key driver of social development due in large part to the work of the IETF.
By Tom Ohanian, Cisco Service Provider Sales Business Development Manger
The desire is all around us—being able to consume the type of content we want, wherever and whenever we want it.
It seems simple. A person merely wants to click on a button and have interactive control of content while it plays back on a range of consumer devices. When we click on a song or a film that we’d like to purchase or rent from an online store, we’re looking for content, convenience, and ease of use.
What the consumer probably isn’t aware of—and most certainly shouldn’t be concerned with—is that a complex digital media supply chain exists before that content becomes available across devices. That supply chain starts with raw materials—the video and audio clips that make up the program—through a series of processes that ultimately create a series of content choices for the consumer to download.
In the “good old days” of broadcasting, content was made available in two formats. Today, by adding Read More »
Mobile video is exploding at a rate unimagined only a few short years ago. Whereas the quick YouTube clip had been a satisfying enough diversion, consumers armed with next-generation devices now demand the latest bandwidth-busting, 2-gigabyte Hollywood opus. The end user wants it on his iPad, and he wants it now.
For the industry at large, this creates no shortage of challenges. According to the Cisco Visual Networking Index, by 2016, 71 percent of global mobile data traffic will be video, placing a heavy burden on the network. But along this next frontier of mobile video there are also unprecedented and exciting opportunities.
