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India’s first Open RAN 5G NSA passes its initiation with Airtel and Mavenir

Nick Booth
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India’s first Open RAN 5G NSA passes its initiation with Airtel and Mavenir

Speeds exceed 1Gbps in 5G NSA mode

Indian telco Airtel has performed the nation’s first Open Radio Access Network (Open RAN) 5G network validation along with network software specialist and compatriot Mavenir. This initiation ceremony with India’s leaders in their respective fields shows that the technology has reached maturity, according to Airtel.

The Open RAN based 5G validation was conducted in Chandigarh and Mohali, over the 3500 MHz band test spectrum allotted to Airtel by the Indian government’s department of telecom. Speeds of over 1 Gbps were validated with the equipment used and configured in non-standalone (NSA) mode, using commercially available 5G mobile devices.

The Mavenir Open Virtualised Radio Access Network (Open vRAN) system is built with off-the-shelf hardware and 3500MHz radio using open interfaces defined by the O-RAN Alliance. Liberated from vendor lock-in, Airtel claimed its new freedom gave it license to virtualise. The new found flexibility opened its eyes to new possibilities and soon it embraced the concept of web-scale containerisation to support the notion that ‘any cloud’ is possible.

Randeep Sekhon, CTO at Bharti Airtel, explained why this is so crucial to a tech powerhouse such as India. “This is a major milestone for the Open RAN ecosystem in India and yet another validation of the growing readiness of 5G networks based on open architecture,” said Sekhon, “We look forward to deepening our technology partnership with Mavenir and collaborate to expedite the use of these radio access networks.”

Airtel has been a board member since the beginning of O-RAN Alliance, which now assembles a world-wide community of more than 300 telecom operators, vendors and research and academic institutions working openly to develop a sustainable Open RAN ecosystem. It was the first operator in India to commercially run an open virtual RAN solution based on disaggregated and open architecture defined by the O-RAN Alliance. 

“We are excited to partner with Airtel on the 5G Open RAN journey, it has given impetus towards a faster deployment of Open RAN,” said BG Kumar, Mavenir’s president of communication services, “Mavenir is committed to the India market with its continued investments towards development of cutting-edge technologies at research and development centres across India.”

Orange Belgium clashes with rival Proximus over customer expectations

Nick Booth
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Orange Belgium clashes with rival Proximus over customer expectations

One plan bundles data and SIMs, the other says pack your bags

Two Belgian mobile operators have launched price plans based on markedly different predictions about customer behaviour in the coming year. Encumbent mobile operator Proximus, has launched a roaming deal, based on the premise that their customers are about to go global. By contrast, Orange Belgium (OB) has announced a raft of data plans that seems to assume Belgians will spend more time a home with their handset. 

OB has announced that it will ‘adapt several prices’ on the first of June. “We [will] increase some tariffs, mostly on mobile services,” explained an Orange Belgium spokesperson, “but we also [will] increase the data volume of these offers and extend the reductions for multi-card customers.”

However, the Belgian mobile operator has promised to improve the content of its offerings and has raised the data cap of all its Go mobile subscriptions, with increases ranging from 0.5 to 10 GB. It is also ‘extending its multi card reductions’ (cutting the price of its multi card bundles).

The cost concessions are OB’s reaction t the ‘economic context, marked by unseen levels of inflation’. “With energy, tech equipment prices and salary costs rapidly growing and impacting the cost structure of Orange Belgium and its suppliers and partners, the operator has to adapt several prices, in order to maintain Orange’s quality of services and level of investment,” said Orange in a translated statement. 

However, these adaptations will concur with a significant improvement in Orange’s Go portfolio, so although tariffs may be up, customers are getting “more for more,” said the OB statement. “Orange Belgium is offering its customers an increasingly large scope of services and content, while building its multi-gigabit networks” it said.

The data cap of every tariff plan will also be increased. The Go Extreme app will be offering 10 extra gigabytes of additional data, raising the cap to 70 GB in total per month.

Orange’s ‘all-in-1’ bundles for their telecom products will not come at higher price however.  Multiple SIM card buyers, choosing from bundles such as 2 Go Intense and Go Extreme and fixed Internet subscribers on the Love package will receive an additional €1 discount on their mobile subscriptions. This saves them €10 per card per month, on a permanent basis, said Orange. Those who buy packages will get more for the same price.

Digitally savvy customers are catered for with a new service, branded hey! which promises ‘simple, sharp-priced mobile subscriptions with data abundance’ where prices do not change. OB said its loyalty programme had created a steady increase in the volume of data to its customers, with a rise of 25 per cent every 3 months. Customers pay 25 euros for unlimited calls, SMS and 80 GB per month.  

Meanwhile, Proximus is urging customers to broaden their minds through real life experiences. “We can finally travel again! But when you leave the European Union, you might have some questions regarding roaming rates and how they work. To travel more relaxed, Proximus decided to redefine its roaming rates by choosing simplicity and transparency,” said a Proximus release. 

Deutsche Telekom asks Airties to close the wi-fi reality gap with tight integration

Nick Booth
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Deutsche Telekom asks Airties to close the wi-fi reality gap with tight integration

If broadband is a right then good quality wi-fi is essential

Airties is to help Deutsche Telekom fine tune the broadband end product it delivers as the quality of wi-fi becomes essential, it said. The wi-fi specialist is to install its suite of ‘smart wi-fi’ systems across Deutsche Telekom’s entire infrastructure in Europe because, according to Airtiels, consumers are getting wise to telcos who market wi-fi and provide woe-fi.

Deutsche Telekom (DT) has 242 million mobile customers, 27 million fixed-network lines, and 22 million broadband lines. Deutsche Telekom is already using RDK open source software to standardise the core functions of its broadband gateways but Airtie’s Edge software could provide the extra integration with the subscribers’ own broadband gateways. Meanwhile, Airties Cloud could provide home performance management and optimisation to customers throughout several markets in Europe.

Airties’ hybrid cloud-edge design embeds intelligence into customer premises equipment (CPE) which then talks to the cloud to make it perform and respond better. Airties Edge is Wi-Fi software that directs all the internet-able things in the home, from computers, through consoles to cameras, to the best available channel and band (2.4GHz and 5GHz), according to the network conditions at the time. This software turns an existing home gateway or modem into an intelligent Wi-Fi access point, improving the quality and stability of connectivity within the home.

This gives consumers a better quality of experience and operators a better quality of feedback which they can tweak further by acting on the ‘insights’ they get on connected devices. The most strategic advantage would be tightened cybersecurity. The Airties Vision companion app gives consumers instant data to manage their in-home wireless experience. Airties Cloud manages 33 million homes and supports 646 million devices across the globe.

“Providing exceptional home broadband is of paramount importance to Deutsche Telekom, and that includes delivering the best possible Wi-Fi to our customers,” said Pedro Bandeira, Vice President of Product and New Business at Deutsche Telekom. Getting consistent, quality home wi-fi is more essential than ever before, according to Airties CEO Philippe Alcaras and DT has recognised this.

Telcos must use ARM to shape the cloud around new services – TrendForce report

Nick Booth
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Telcos must use ARM to shape the cloud around new services – TrendForce report

AWS is pioneering the trend to make telco clouds more flexible

The digital transformation of telcos is slowly changing the nature of the cloud infrastructure, according to a new report by analyst TrendForce. The relatively clunky and monolithic x86 chip is being replaced by ARM processors, which are better suited to the instruments, such as artificial intelligence, needed to mobilise the traditional telco’s stiff silos of information and the high performance computing power which could jump start the old monoliths. 

The need for new types of flexible data centre is slowly changing the way cloud infrastructure is built, according to the report. TrendForce Research (TRR) says the top cloud service providers have introduced ARM-based servers and it’s a trend the researchers expect to intensify, propelling ARM’s penetration rate in data centre servers to 22 per cent by 2025. 

ARM’s Neoverse Platform plan will be one of the key drivers of penetration because it created a product line that’s ideal for ultra-large-scale data centres and edge computing infrastructures. But TrendForce believes that it will still be difficult for ARM-based servers to compete with x86-based servers before 2025. A lot could happen in three years however. 

Imperious cloud market leader Amazon Web Services (AWS) has influenced this trend, with ARM-based processing units now comprising 15 per cent of its total installed base of servers. By the end of 2022 the proportion will have changed to 20 per cent, according to TRR. 

AWS will be an influencer for telco cloud providers that follow in its wake, says the research. It will force “other major cloud service providers to keep up by initiating their own projects at various foundries. If testing is successful, [AWS’s] projects are expected to start mass introduction in 2025,” according to the research. 

A number of factors have made ARM attractive to the cloud builders, who have until now instinctively bought Intel and made the x86 chip the standard unit for data centre. ARM chips have three advantages for cloud builders, according TRR’s analysis. 

Firstly, the modern diverse and rapidly changing workloads better characteristic of the cloud are better supported by ARM chips, which can create a more flexible and adaptive computing culture. Intel is relatively monolithic and its chips are becoming the IBM mainframe of the cloud. The key is in the scale of disaggregation of functions.

Secondly, ARM-based processors are more customisable, so they can be adapted for niche markets with a more flexible ecosystem. As telcos explore the creation of 5G services that people will actually pay for, they will need to experiment a lot and creativity brings variety. 

Thirdly, the physical footprint of ARM-powered systems is relatively small which, according to the TRR analysis, is a far better building block for the nature of the infrastructure that modern telcos need. Their private clouds will use mini data centres, in which ARM-based processors will serve their purposes better

Recent geopolitical events including war in Ukraine and a wave of state sponsored hacking, have emphasised the need for national data sovereignty and cybersecurity, said the TrendForce Research. The development of very local and small ‘edge’ data centres has better long-term consequences if ARM-based processors are used as they consume less power and need less space, it concluded.

Vodafone Ukraine and Lifecell have restored services to 34 recaptured regions and towns of Irpin and Romanivka

Nick Booth
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Vodafone Ukraine and Lifecell have restored services to 34 recaptured regions and towns of Irpin and Romanivka

Phone shops refused to close even as war raged around them

Vodafone Ukraine has restored its services in the towns of Irpin and Romanivka in Ukraine while rival operator Lifecell claims to have restored services in 34 settlements of the Kyiv region after the occupying Russian forces were pushed back.

Vodafone Ukraine has re-booted a base station supporting GSM and LTE services near the sites that have been recently regained from Russian occupation by the Ukrainian army. The base station works with backhaul support from satellite internet provider Starlink, part of SpaceX. The operator has used satellite to restore connections with locations whose network infrastrcutre was damaged during military actions. 

The telco has disclosed that 287 of its shops and service centres are working despite the war in Ukraine. The list includes 46 owned shops and 244 of its dealerships. The operator plans to re-open 12 more of its own service centres from 01 April. The operator added that it already allocated €463,764 (£388,5000) in aid in relation to the war.

In mid March Vodafone Ukraine suspended limits for mobile data sharing for customers connected to tariff plans Vodafone Unlimited 3G, Vodafone Unlimited 3G Plus, Vodafone SuperNet Unlimited and Vodafone SuperNet Turbo 2019. Both daily and monthly paid data sharing options are available to customers automatically. The operator said the relaxed conditions will be available until the end of the war with Russia.

Ukraine’s Ministry of Digitalisation has upgraded its mobile application warning residents of attacks by Russian air forces. The app lets users control the volume of voice messages issued at the beginning and end of attacks. The same info is also available on a Telegram channel. Operators Lifecell, Vodafone Ukraine and Kyivstar won’t charge for mobile data traffic on the application. 

More than 3.5 million Ukrainian residents have already downloaded the app, which was designed by the Ajax Systems with IT company Stfalcon and the support of the Ministry of Finance.

Lifecell said it has restored communications in the localities of Velikiye Gulyaki, Gruzskoe, Dzvonkovo, Hazing, Knyazhichi, Kozichanka, Konchaki, Leonovka, Lychanka, Lishnya, Lubskoe, Mriya, Muzichi, Negrashi, Novoselki, Osykovo, Perevoz, Prishevalnya, Sosnovka, Tomashovka, Farm, Chernogorodka, Yablunovka, Yaroshevka. Communication was partially restored in the following localities: Irpen, Stoyanka, Buzova, Gorbovichi, Gurovschina, Zhornovka, Lyubimovka, Mostyshche, Petrushki, Shpitki.

NTT DoCoMo to manage customer information with Oracle Cloud

Nick Booth
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NTT DoCoMo to manage customer information with Oracle Cloud

Disaggregated computing propels a more flexible service culture

NTT DoCoMo has opted for the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure (OCI) as the new development system for its customer information management. The challenge is substantial because the ALADIN (ALl Around DoCoMo INformation Systems) is one of the largest of its kind in the world, since the telco has 83 million subscribers. 

Japanese’s biggest mobile operator is moving its vast customer database into the Oracle Cloud so it can be disaggregated and managed in Kubernetes containers. It will be operated on by 300 developers who will orchestrate its silos of data into a well marshalled raft of services, the telco hopes.

Oracle’s project managers will use OCI to harness the talents of some 300 developers to build modern applications in a faster, more regimented and cost-efficient work culture, the telco hopes. Meanwhile NTT DoCoMo will get access to more powerful computing resources as it expands its telecoms, internet and ‘smart life services’ (AKA applications). In addition, DoCoMo has moved its on-premises Oracle Database for database training to Oracle Database Cloud Service on OCI.

At the moment Aladin supports DoCoMo’s 83 million subscribers, handling all customer-related operations, ranging from simple membership and transactional data, through credit checks, contract data and assignment of telephone numbers. However, it’s getting a lot more complicated as NTT DoCoMo’s customer information becomes more wide reaching and the mobile operator’s ‘d Point Club’ reward points programme further complicates matters. Then there are the growing numbers of traditional mobile subscribers, some new customer encounters, such as chatbots and smart devices. 

Each developer now has a dedicated environment and can flexibly change resources during peak and slow periods of development, eliminating the need to manually provision and shut down environments and providing the resources needed on demand. NTT DoCoMo is also using Oracle Container Engine for Kubernetes (OKE) for containerisation, and plans to use Continuous Integration and Continuous Delivery and Deployment (CI/CD) tools to automate operational management.

As part of the cloud migration, NTT DoCoMo has also moved its on-premises Oracle Database environment to Oracle Database Cloud Service on OCI. This cut costs by 95 per cent by minimising the manual workload needed for management.

The best way to deal with all the complication is to disaggregate everything, from data, through software to hardware, as much as possible and put it into the cloud, according to Tadaaki Yoshida, at NTT DoCoMo’s Information Systems Department. “The new environment on OCI supports development, coding and integration testing. Its roll-out has quickly proven how we can optimise our costs and improve developer productivity and efficiency through containerisation and automation said Yoshida. “The Oracle Cloud Free Tier also has let us build the new environment quickly and cheaper. We plan to move the entire development environment to the cloud as we prepare for the future migration of our commercial environment.”

There is no mystery about the cloud, according to Toshimitsu Misawa, member of the board, corporate executive officer and president of Oracle Corporation Japan. Since OCI is developer-friendly, that makes it easy for telcos to build and run new applications and arm themselves with “game-changing technologies like artificial intelligence and machine learning.”

NTT DoCoMo said it will move the final operation testing environment, currently in an on-premises location, to the Oracle Cloud in the near future.

Kenya’s new €361m Peace subsea cable already making waves

Nick Booth
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Kenya’s new €361m Peace subsea cable already making waves

Link up with Asia and Europe fuels Africa’s fastest growing economy

Thirteen years after Kenya welcomed its first ever fibre optic cable, the country has now unveiled a sixth submarine internet cable, reports The East African. The recent launch of the Pakistan and East Africa Connecting Europe (Peace) cable at the end of March came after a boom in data usage when the country’s internet economy was boosted by the Covid-19 pandemic.

The €361 million cable connects Africa to France and Pakistan through the Europe-Asia route, directly linking to Asia which could cut the comms delays between Africa and Asia.

The launch is a partnership between Peace and Kenya’s mobile operator Telkom, which claims to be the most affordable mobile operator in the East African nation. Kenya boasts one of the fastest growing economies on the continent but also the most expensive mobile data in East Africa, according to the GSM’s global Mobile Data Index.

The 15,000 kilometre cable is expected to create more flexible digital connection options, including speeds of 200 Gbps per single wavelength with a total capacity of 192 Terabits per second, as well as more stable and secure data access.

Speaking during the launch at Nyali, Mombasa, the government’s ICT and Youth Affairs Cabinet Secretary Joe Mucheru said Kenya was right inside the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) where demand for fast internet is at an all-time high.

“Right now, you can enjoy 5G data speeds at Uhuru Gardens. This will revolutionise how Kenyans consume the internet. 5G smartphone penetration in Kenya is growing. More online business opportunities will be unlocked by this cable,” said Mucheru.

The growth in consumer demand for connectivity and data could create new markets for co-location data centres, content development networks and over-the-top service providers in the country, said Peace Cable’s chief operating officer, Sun Xiaohua. “Peace will bring more diversified digital connection options and provide high-speed, large-capacity and stable data access opportunities to Kenya,” said Xiaohua. 

Telkom currently operates and maintains five of the six submarine cables that have landed in Kenya. “We’re upgrading and expanding our 4G capacity in the Coast region, before moving into other areas across the country. This Sh14 billion nationwide rollout is part of our long-term network expansion strategy,” said Telkom CEO Mugo Kibati.

Peace, a Hong Kong-based cable network founded in 2018, said its second phase will see the cable extend to Singapore and Southern Africa, boosting bandwidth and connectivity from its current African landing point in Mombasa, all the way to South Africa, consequently opening new markets in the Southern African Development Community (SADC).

When the East African Marine System (TEAMS) internet cable was first launched in June 2009 there was much talk of a digital transformation into a Silicon Savannah. Though those excitable predictions were premature the gradual laying of more cables has placed Kenya at the apex of internet penetration in Africa.

Since then, other internet cables landing in Mombasa have been the Eastern Africa Submarine Cable System (EASSy), the Lower Indian Ocean Network (LION), Seacom and the Djibouti Africa Regional Express 1 (DARE1), carrying data at speeds of 5.2 Tbps, 12.3 Tbps, 18.6 Tbps, 12 Tbps and 36 Tbps respectively. 

Kenya Power also uses internet cables to manage the national electricity grid and leases the excess capacity to Safaricom, Airtel, Liquid Telecom and Jamii Telecommunications. Since launch in 2010, Kenya Power has cumulatively earned Sh3.02 billion (£€237 million) from the fibre leasing business, in its 4,000 kilometre long cables.

The International Finance Corporation (IFC) estimates a total of 1.1 million kilometers of fibre cables have been laid in Africa with 50 per cent of them being deployed by mobile operators. About 40 per cent of all 450,000 kilometers of fibre optic cable in Africa, is owned publicly by government networks, state-owned enterprises and utilities, according to IFC.

KKR to withdraw from TIM deal if due diligence is still a problem

Nick Booth
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KKR to withdraw from TIM deal if due diligence is still a problem

Fund holder may still table takeover bid but market conditions have changed since November

KKR will drop its €10.8 billion ($11.9 billion) takeover proposal for Telecom Italia (TIM) if the due diligence it requested in November is delayed any longer, according to Bloomberg News.

In a letter expected on April 4, KKR will restate its interest in a possible bid, said Bloomberg’s sources. However, the New York-based private equity firm is clear that it’s now even more keen to review the telco’s finances because much has changed in the four months it has waited for an audit. Telecoms market conditions have shifted and the four month delay over the audit disclosure may have influenced KKR’s thinking. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and the recent downgrades on Telecom Italia’s credit rating are among the reasons cited in the letter, according to the sources.

TIM CEO Pietro Labriola is working on an alternative plan for the former national carrier, revealed in January 2022, in which the telco’s landline assets will be merged with Open Fiber. The union of these state-owned national assets would be more in line with the Italian government’s desire for a single national fibre network. 

In February it was revealed that TIM and Open Fiber are already in discussions to share infrastructure and save money while laying fibre in Italy’s remotest regions. However, the formation of this pact could take several months as it needs approval from European regulators.

KTIM’s second largest investor, the state bank Cassa Depositi e Prestiti (CDP) would get a majority stake in TIM’s fixed network assets. CDP is also the controlling shareholder of Open Fiber. 

On Saturday, Telecom Italia confirmed in a statement that it signed a non-disclosure agreement with CDP to start preliminary discussions on integrating its network with that of Open Fiber. This deal is also open to KKR and other funds, said ‘two other people familiar with the matter’. Labriola has another possible plan to separate all Telecom Italia’s commercial services into another unit called ServCo, according to Telecom Italia’s business plan. 

At the end of March another private equity bidder emerged, as CVC Capital Partners made a non-binding offer for 49 per cent of Telecom Italia’s new enterprise services unit. According to Reuters a number of private equity companies have expressed interest in asset stripping Italy’s telco flagship. TIM plans to discuss CVC’s non-binding bid in a board meeting scheduled for April 7 after the company’s annual general meeting, sources told Bloomberg.

Nokia and Rakuten Mobile break the 1 Terabit per second channel speed barrier

Nick Booth
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Nokia and Rakuten Mobile break the 1 Terabit per second channel speed barrier

Achieving a terabit per channel is an outstanding expansion of fibre’s potential

Comms equipment maker Nokia and Japanese mobile operator Rakuten Mobile have achieved a data speed record of 1 Tbps per channel transmission over Rakuten Mobile’s commercial dense wavelength division multiplexer (DWDM) network, a 500 per cent increase on Rakuten Mobile’s already impressive 200 Gbps domestic download.

In two days in January 2022 the vendor and operator connected two data centres, separated by 135 km across the Kanto region of Japan, with the fastest data speeds ever achieved in a single channel. The intelligence was exchanged between the two facilities using Nokia’s Photonic Service Engine (PSE) whose 150 GHz optical spectrum operated at its full 1 Tbps capacity. Though equipment rarely uses 100 per cent of its potential at all times, the trial shows that Nokia’s equipment can shift 32 Tb/s of data, per fibre, in C-band.

This capacity could be expanded to 64 Tbps by adding L-band over the Nokia DWDM line system used in Rakuten Mobile’s optical network. These could support the latest generations of routers delivering 800 Gbps Ethernet, according to John Lancaster-Lennox, head of Nokia’s Japanese Market Unit. “The Terabit per channel trial [showed] we can dramatically increase fibre capacity and future-proof the Rakuten Mobile network infrastructure to support a new high speed data centre interconnection.”

The Open Line System field trial, over Rakuten Mobile’s existing commercial network, used Nokia’s Photonic Service Engine inhouse Digital Signal Processor (DSP), a compact, high capacity, modular optical networking platform, optimised for Data Centre Interconnect (DCI) applications over metro, regional and long haul links.

Rakuten Mobile said it now scaling up its network capacity to enable 5G connectivity, video and new applications for its mobile subscribers and business partners.

Rakuten Mobile CEO Tareq Amin said Nokia’s 1 Tbps system will make it fleet footed, with a smaller footprint, shrunken opex and greater flexibility to rollout in data centres. “We are delighted with the performance on our optical network. This technical milestone will allow us to maximize bits per fibre and achieve improved power efficiency. The extra capacity will also support our traffic growth, deliver higher bandwidth and allow Rakuten Mobile to provide new service offerings,” said Amin.

Multi-cloud strategy has dangerous undercurrents for telcos – VMware, ADP and IDC experts warn

Nick Booth
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Multi-cloud strategy has dangerous undercurrents for telcos – VMware, ADP and IDC experts warn

It’s turbulent and currents are not necessarily in harmony

A multi-cloud strategy could be fatal for any telco, delegates heard at a recent NetEvents conference on Multi-Cloud and Cloud Native Networking. 

Conference host Brad Casemore, VP of Research, Datacenters and Multicloud Networking at analyst IDC, warned of a disconnect. Mobile Europe has pushed him for more detail, such as: what’s the worst thing that can happen to a telco caught between multiple clouds? Do cloud operators care?

“Multiple-clouds are always going be a pain because each cloud provider is understandably focused on its own services for enterprise customers,” said Casemore. Individually, they are not concerned with optimising the experience and access to competitive services or other clouds. Enterprises such as telcos, of course, have a different perspective, and many may be tempted to use multiple clouds to achieve digital resilience. 

“This disconnect, pardon the pun, is why multi-cloud complexity, in a network and connectivity context, is such a challenge,” said Casemore. “It’s a turbulent river, where the currents aren’t necessarily in harmony. If enterprises don’t navigate carefully, they can indeed founder on the rocky shores or get slowed down or pulled under amid the complexity.”  

Guest speaker Ranga Rajagopalan, chief architect at hypervisor specialist VMware, likened the polyamorous enterprise cloud experience to a potential horror story. “Imagine the telco is moving into a new neighbourhood [in the cloud]. They try to make friends but soon discover Jason from Halloween lives in the first house, Freddie from Nightmare on Elm Street is in the second and Ghostface from Scream is in the third. Each cloud villain wants the poor neighbour for itself,” said Rajagopalan.   

The telco protagonist needs to live in the cloud neighbourhood and must carefully play off and balance each cloud villain against the others. To make matters worse, there’s also a gang in of hackers in the area, constantly casing the block to rob homes. Your party needs to protect its hardware from them too. 

“That’s how enterprises are dealing with multiple clouds – it’s a balancing act to use them efficiently, but not be captive to any of them, while there are constant security threats,” said VMware’s 

Security specialist Stewart Parkin, CTO at Assured Data Protection explained how a telco in a state of cloud incongruity brings with it its own unique data protection frustrations. Protecting its data and recovering it, from ‘any cloud’ to ’any cloud’, in reasonable time, is virtually impossible, Parkin warned. 

“It’s a management nightmare. Maintaining different tool sets, formats and data repositories is one thing – but it’s very uncommon for these to work intra-cloud. You can’t backup an Amazon EC2 instance in AWS backup, then restore it to an Azure Virtual Machine with the native tools,” said Parkin.

Telcos forget that you also need to check a multitude of backup tools to ensure that their EC2 and RDS instances, Azure SQL PaaS databases, GCP VMs have all backed up. “The report says they backed up, but did they work, how do you test that, across platforms, while also making sure those 20 new virtual machines that DevOps has just spun up for a new critical application, are in protection?” said Parkin. 

There are other questions that typically get overlooked in the rush to the clouds, said Parkin, who gave a few examples: Are all of the company policies across the clouds, correct? Are they the same? Do they meet regulatory requirements? If you need to change a policy, where do you need to change? What affect might that have on other data?

For compliance you must ensure that the backup data is immutable, segregated from the production platform owners, encrypted, stored within region and out of region if needed, said Parkin. 

Other questions arise, Parkin warned the telcos: “What does your cross-region egress look like? Are you storing it out of cloud and if so, what does the egress cost here? If you are taking it out of cloud, are the backups portable? Could you use the EC2 snapshot to recover the VM locally to VMware or Azure if you needed to? If not, why take it out of the cloud, you’ve essentially got a very expensive collection of ones and zeros,” said Parkin

All of these things can be fixed, and catered for, but they need to planned and controlled with the right technologies and solutions. However, now that people expect things to happen just because they clicked a button, the boring but vital work such as data protection, backups and recovery are often left for a rainy day. On that day they will become the single most important thing in the telco’s business, warned Parkin.

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