The recent announcement by Procera Networks, the global Internet Intelligence company on the selection of its Network Application Visibility Library (NAVL) to be part of Connectem's virtual evolved packet core (vEPC) marks a huge step in the mobile operators' Network Virtualization initatives. Connectem is a provider of cloud-based Virtual Core for Mobile (VCM) solution for mobile network operators, based in San Jose, US. NAVL is a next-generation Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) software engine that provides real-time, Layer-7 classification of network traffic. In a statement by Procera, the Connectum solution which is the industry’s first for a virtual environment, enables application identification, traffic visibility, intelligence and control via Procera’s NAVL software, offering all of the advanced traffic management functions, and delivers world-class analytics in the demanding mobile network environments that providers are building today.
Connectem’s vEPC provides ongoing, real-time application usage information that is critical to mobile providers, where analytics and usage data can help define product mix and potential new service offerings, as well as alert operators to new and emerging trends.
“In our review of Procera’s NAVL product, we found that Procera is committed to the vendors that are developing products for the NFV environment,That commitment, combined with a laser-focus on simplicity of integration and performance, makes NAVL a great fit for inclusion in our vEPC product. We look forward to introducing our product in the market, knowing that we have chosen the right partner from a network analytics and deep packet inspection perspective.”- Bill Harry, Founder, Connectem
“Enabling strong partners such as Connectem with state-of-the-art embedded intelligence is what NAVL was designed to do from the ground up. As the market moves toward NFV, Procera’s commitment to powering these NFV solutions with embedded products remains steadfast. We have made significant investments in critical engineering functions to further expand NAVL’s market leadership in this space, and feedback from our customers and prospects has been strong—with many already making commitments to Procera’s NAVL application identification engine.”- James Dirksen, Vice-President of OEM Products, Procera Networks
Exclusive with PCC Mobile Broadband
PCC Mobile Broadband spoke to Procera and Connectem on how the solution will expedite the roll out of new services and improve network performance and efficiencies.
Barry Hill, the VP of Sales and Marketing of Connectem highlighted that the solution will enable operators to accelerate time-to-market, especially in an environment where newer and more innovative services are constantly evolving. With the growth in virtualization, pre-integrated solutions will provide an edge in performance optimization, on both data and control plane. In addition, the pre-integration removes the need for time consuming interoperability testing that comes with the deployment of individual components.
Shawn Sweeney, the Director of Product Management and Marketing from Procera Networks shared on how the availability of biweekly signature updates makes it simpler for operators to keep up with new applications and services. This will significantly reduce the time taken to roll out new services such as application bundles, keeping up with the dynamism in the applications sought by subscribers.
Nishi Kant, CEO of Connectem highlighted that the key strenght of the pre-integrated vEPC is its comprehensiveness - where all key components are made available in a single solution. Most importantly, the solution delivers the much sought after Service Assurance functionality, which is proving to be critical as more and more operators rely on real-time information from the user plane and control plane to design, roll out and manage their suite of services. Central to the theme of the solution, he added, is the network transformation which aims to scale up the network performance and capabilities to meet the exponential growth in demand. Pre-integrated solutions on virtualization platforms not only meet this demand, they also deliver cost savings from simplication, migration to software-based models and the savings on steep R&D costs. Connectem confirmed that trials have been successfully conducted and were demonstrated with a mobile operator in a recent event in Croatia.
Sachin Kapur, VP of Engineering from Connectem pointed out that the solution simply takes advantage of the available resources, maximizing them and delivering superior reliability and performance. According to Sachin, the solution enables Operators to take advantage of the dynamism provided by a common platform. Its application view now enables operators to apply any number of connectivity, throughput and IP flows compared to the earlier systems which required separate components to be deployed for separate applications. Sachin also emphasized that smaller operators will benefit from this solution, which they can accesss via the hosted cloud, whilst bigger players deploy their own private cloud.
