Ericsson Cloud System gets Hyperscale Boost

As can be imagined at a show as big and diverse as Mobile World Congress (MWC) 2015 in Barcelona there are lots of interesting topics around “hot topics.”  However, if you interest in what is going on in terms of the intersection of the cloud and mobility, no topics are hotter that cloud security and the increasing traction that Intel’s Rack Scale Architecture is getting for the development of hyperscale data centers.  Indeed, the need for bigger, more agile and more secure data centers to deal with the explosion of mobile network traffic is propelling interest in the need for being hyper.

An example of these trends comes from Ericsson who chose Barcelona as the place to announce Ericsson Cloud System upgrades aimed at hyperscale cloud implementations. These enhancements to the company’s cloud portfolio include:

• Ericsson HDS (Hyperscale Datacenter System) 8000
• Ericsson Secure Cloud Storage system
• Ericsson Continuum.

The Ericsson HDS 8000 is a new breed of hyperscale datacenter system puts Intel Rack Scale Architecture to work to produce a new breed of system that not only works better, but also reduces total cost of ownership. It combines a disaggregated hardware architecture with optical interconnect to remove the traditional distance and capacity limitations of electrical connections. And, as Ericsson highlights there are significant benefits here including a more efficient pooling of resources which translates into , which has a positive impact on utilization and energy consumption.

Ericsson Secure Cloud Storage, is pre-integrated portfolio of data services complementing the policy-driven hybrid PaaS layer. It is aimed at streamlining web scale development and deployment of new  applications, and according to Ericsson, “adds leading cloud software databases that span traditional relational databases to web scale, big data NoSQL type databases.” Plus, Ericsson is partnering with web scale object storage solutions provider Cleversafe. The first announced product from the collaboration is a secure object storage capable of controlling access with policy and guaranteeing carrier-grade data and system security and integrity of data.

Ericsson Continuum is a policy-driven Platform-as-a-Service (PaaS) tool that allows for multiple cloud systems to be brought into use under a hybrid system, and uses Docker containers to produce not only a secure system, but one that can be scaled as needed, and proves to be highly cost effective and compliant with applicable regulations.

In addition, the Ericsson Cloud System offers up complete support for open platform for network functions virtualization (OPNFV), which in turn should provide a host of benefits for operators planning a NFV-centered approach to some operations. The new software is expected to be available starting in the second quarter of this year, however, the Ericsson HDS 8000 won't be available until the fourth quarter, according to reports.

Commenting on the enhancements at MWC, Hans Vestberg, Ericsson President and CEO explained that: "Technology change is exponential in the ICT industry but investment in infrastructure cannot be. With Intel and other industry leaders we are bringing a hyperscale approach across both software and hardware, we are re-inventing the future data center concept from a total architecture and economics perspective."

Brian Krzanich, CEO, Intel Corporation noted: "We believe it's important for the industry to collaborate to transform network infrastructure and accelerate the delivery of telecommunications, cloud and data center services. Our efforts with Ericsson and their use of Intel(R) Rack Scale Architecture will drive continued innovation in the data center."

As MWC is proving network transformation of both enterprise data centers and those of service providers has taken on a sense of urgency for operational and competitive reasons.  SDN and NFV are now not just top of mind but on “to-do” lists, and the solutions providers are all in on assuring bigger really is better in terms of performance overall, agility and security. They are getting hyper about network infrastructure transformation. 

Edited by Peter Bernstein