Background

The importance of speedy and reliable connectivity has never been more apparent than during the global pandemic. Nonetheless, modern network technologies also hold the key to global recovery. As countries slowly emerge from the pandemic, industries will seek to accelerate their efforts to automate, digitize, and enhance their capabilities, making it a critical time for communication service providers (CSPs) to deliver on the immense potential and power of 5G.

The higher throughput rates, and increased bandwidth capacity of the 5G network, when optimized by multi-access edge computing (MEC) creates virtualized cloud computing environments to improve network efficiency and delivery of content and applications. 5G and MEC together provides exceptional levels of computing and network performance, with high speeds, reduced latency, and increased security, required to power the most demanding applications and workloads like artificial intelligence, IoT, and virtual reality.

Requirements

A leading SDN vendor joined forces with Lanner hardware platform to create a complete, end-to-end MEC solution for a Canadian telecom company. The joint solution delivers the low latency and high bandwidth expected of MEC implementations as well as the carrier grade performance, flexibility, reliability, and security that CSPs require. The unparalleled MEC solution meets the following requirements:

●Multi-Nodes Computing Power

Lanner white-box MEC hardware platform aggregates up to 12 (2^nd Gen) Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors, 2 high-speed P4-programmable Barefoot Tofino switching ASICs, and massive storage with support for precision time protocol (PTP), as an all-in-one modular appliance.

●P4 Programmable Switch

Utilizing Intel® architecture and P4-programmable Barefoot Tofino switching technologies, the platform provides network operators more control and visibility, in addition to flexibility to meet the needs of expanding deployments.

●NEBS-ready High Reliability

The MEC platform meets NEBS-3 compliance, a necessary specification to function as a carrier-grade hardware in service provider and telecom network environments.

● High Scalability

The MEC platform supports VNF load balancing, security mitigation, and a visual operation management interface to flexibly increase or decrease resource usage according to demand. With SDN control and forwarding, the platform integrates multiple network functions into an easy to manage and deployable solution, enhances application performance and reduce processing costs at the edge.

Solution

In this collaboration, Lanner presented its HTCA-6600 carrier-grade network appliance – optimized for easy, scalable, and secure services at the network edge. The platform delivers multi-node compute power with up to twelve 2n Generation Intel® Xeon® ® Scalable processors and two high-speed P4-programmable Barefoot Tofino switching ASICs to boost hardware performance for MEC infrastructure. Additionally, HTCA-6600 has substantial configurable storage capability, and switch blade and CPU blade redundancy.

This all-in-one modular network appliance is integrated with NoviFlow’s CyberMapper, delivering high throughput and dynamically scalable network services, while reducing total customer network CAPEX and OPEX.

Lanner’s HTCA Platforms integrate compute, switching, storage and management in one system and have advantages over the prevalent infrastructure in aspects of hardware design, customization options and cost/energy efficiency.