Cost and Performance Analysis of Network Function Virtualization Based Cloud Systems

As the users on the cloud network increase, the consumption of the Compute, Network and Storage resources also increases. This leads to increase in the cost of deployment, configuration and maintenance. Hence, the Capital Expenditure (CAPEX) of the organization providing the cloud network increases. Network Function Virtualization (NFV) is a technology which virtualizes network functionalities. This paper studies the influence of NFV on CAPEX of cloud based networks and compares it with traditional implementation (without NFV) of such networks. A prototype cloud network based on NFV implementation is developed and implemented. Based on the test cases developed on the prototype, CAPEX of the resources used for both NFV based and traditional implementations are studied and analyzed. RESTful web services are created for the users of the cloud network to orchestrate and manage the network on the cloud. The results accomplished show that NFV based implementation reduces the CAPEX, when compared with the traditional implementation. It is also observed that orchestration mechanism reduces complexity of management of cloud network. A use case with simple web server is developed to compare the performance of a system on Cloud with that of a physical system.