The internet and transport network management ecosystems: A roadmap toward convergence

For many years, the convergence of IP data services and transport network services based on optical transmission has been at the heart of carriers' investments and business strategies. However, significant challenges still remain. Over time, the inherent technological differences between the IP and transport networks have deeply segmented their operation, leading to the carrier's organizational fragmentation and segregation of management competencies. Although these two networks are typically deployed in tandem, carriers still lack of tools capable of providing automated coordination of management procedures and orchestration of business practices between them, especially, in multi-vendor deployments. Overall, the separation of management functions between the “IP” and “transport” networks continues to be profound, and remains one of the major impediments hindering the expected convergence of IP and transport network services. To address this challenge, we present a roadmap for convergence from the point of view of network management, and describe an easy-to-deploy solution that can enable interoperation and coordinated actions between the IP and transport management systems already in place in carrier networks. This solution is being prototyped with special attention on multi-vendor network management scenarios.