Korea Telecom makes NFV move with Alcatel-Lucent

Korea Telecom is the latest service provider to make a shot in the emerging network functions virtualization (NFV) battle, employing a mix of Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE: ALU) and its Nuage Networks subsidiary's software defined networking (SDN) platforms.

With a focus on driving NFV adoption in Korea, KT said the collaboration with Alcatel-Lucent is part of its effort to evolve its Giga Network where NFV will drive the creation of a new architecture to increase efficiency, lower costs and increase cloud products.

The two companies will work together to create a NFV proof-of-concept that includes three of Alcatel-Lucent's key SDN and NFV elements: Virtualized Evolved Packet Core (vEPC) systems to provide advanced service delivery capabilities; CloudBand NFV platform for the management of the NFV environment; and Nuage Networks Virtualized Services Platform (VSP) for SDN to consolidate and automate the network.

While the implementation of SDN and NFV is still early, this trial with KT is important for Alcatel-Lucent and Nuage as they look to drive more visibility for their products and solutions in this market segment.

According to an Infonetics survey issued earlier this year, service provider interest in NFV and SDN is growing.

In its SDN and NFV Strategies: Global Service Provider Survey, the research firm found that 29 percent of survey participants are currently implementing SDNs, and 52 percent plan to evaluate SDNs by the end of 2014. Likewise, just about every service provider Infonetics surveyed said they plan to deploy SDN (97 percent) or NFV (93 percent) in some aspect of their network at some point.

For more:
- see the release

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