Unless it is completely newly incorporated telco, it hardly without been handicap in somewhere by the past infrastructure they invested, and further complicated with various network monitoring system (NMS) and element monitoring system (EMS) typically deployed with the new project along the years. The result is a mix of generation of network and element monitoring system. Despite knowing the needs for the integrated and more modern network performance monitoring and diagnostics system (NMPD) for the entire business, in operation, it seems to make sense to have multiple suboptimal systems. No to mention the people who operate it will resist the change, and prefer “integration” or “customisation” instead of completely replacing the old system in place.
The world is toward virtualization, where telecommunication infrastructure deployment needs to adapt for it too. From the network function virtualization (NFV) means more cost efficiencies, time-to-market improvements, and innovation to the telecommunication industry, but you are surprised to see a lot of telco remain operate in the suboptimal manner. You will not be surprised to see hundreds of the monitoring system spread across the entire operation regionally. Until the telco industry eventually accepts telcos backend completely virtualized and brings in benefits and value of flexibility, cost, scalability and security.
The world continues to require higher bandwidth year by year, where most of the telco shift their core business from delivering calls to mobile internet, to being internet service provider (ISP). We continue to expect that telco will attempt to offer datacenter as a service to enterprise customers, as well as offer 5G and beyond as the time comes for the area they do business. Whether or not telco can modernize their infrastructure, and the benefits for increment (upgrade from previous generation of invested system) or complete new infrastructure based on the modern and tomorrow world.
Massive Internet of things (IoT) that automates and supports digital transformation and 5G and beyond require higher bandwidth and lower latency as well. As more emerging technologies implement, so do new areas for security threats. 5G and beyond expands the attack surface to more connected devices. 5G vulnerabilities is still the new area needed to work on. So do more network virtualization vulnerabilities as carriers shift from industry traditional hardware and appliance based to software based and software defined infrastructure and network.
