Strategies for Next-Gen Service Assurance in the 5G and cloud era
There’s a lot of evolution going on in the industry today. There’s the transition to 5G mobile networks including edge cloud build-outs and the massive adoption of network virtualization and cloud technologies. There’s increasing complexity of hybrid cloud service rollouts that leverage SD-WAN to connect end-user apps and devices to data center hosted cloud applications. And let’s not forget network automation enabling closed-loop systems, data lakes with AIOps driving early warning systems, zero-touch provisioning and testing systems, and OSS/BSS modernization.
These are just some of the key telco initiatives discussed in a research brief published by Converge! Network Digest and AvidThink that I was recently re-reading. It’s on the topic of “Service Assurance – A Critical Telco Capability: Exploring Next-Gen Challenges and Opportunities” (and full disclosure that we placed a full-page Juniper Networks ad in it on Service-Centric Operations with Active Assurance because this technology is at the heart of Next-Gen Service Assurance).
The Service Assurance research brief discusses various service challenges and opportunities including the need for complete lifecycle visibility, end-to-end multi-domain, multi-silo coverage, end-user application context with multi-layer network and application assurance, virtualization including containerization and more. These are all the same challenges that Juniper Paragon Automation provides a solution for by automating across the full lifecycle of the network and services in a way that continually puts assuring the end-to-end service experience first.
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Juniper Paragon Automation is a modular suite of cloud-native software applications that deliver closed-loop automation in the most demanding 5G and multi-cloud environments. These solutions translate business intent into real-world performance across the lifecycle of a network and services. They eliminate manual tasks and processes, empowering operations teams to work more quickly, efficiently, and accurately. And they protect customers and business by measuring real service quality on the data plane, assuring that users have a consistent, high-quality experience throughout the life of their service.
Unlike other vendors’ solutions, some of which were developed before the iPhone, Paragon Automation is built for 5G and multicloud. Paragon Automation is fully cloud-native and microservices-based, bringing cloud flexibility, elasticity, and resiliency to the network.
Service providers are looking to differentiate from their competition to win new business and to combat churn. This means that they are now putting differentiated and guaranteed service levels at the center of their business models. Offering service differentiation at scale is a daunting task. In a Network Media Group panel session with executive speakers from Verizon Business, BT, Juniper Networks and AvidThink, insights are offered on how to leverage network automation solutions to effectively align people, processes and technology and ensure customer experience is always made a priority.
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Coming back to the Converge! Network Digest and AvidThink Service Assurance research and summarizing further, an important point to highlight is that it outlines various concrete approaches to Service Assurance that several leading communications service providers (CSPs) and other ecosystem thought leaders have been working on. As I examined the research brief with Juniper Paragon Automation in mind, I started to think about how Juniper is allowing CSPs to pursue all these approaches. Let me explain how!
Investing in automation
Applicable Juniper solution components: Entire Paragon Automation suite
Network automation is a road to enhanced customer experience, as we have discussed in our FutureNet Asia “WAN Optimization” podcast. This topic covers increasing customer expectations in the 5G and cloud era as a key driver, the importance of measuring customer experience, how automation helps to guarantee service quality, what CSPs can do today and where immediate gains can be achieved.
With Paragon Automation to translate business intent into service performance, customers receive an assured service experience throughout the life of their service. Its modular cloud native applications are independently deployable to suit operational needs and are also seamlessly integrated into one platform for combined use-cases supporting multivendor networks. Intuitive GUIs with streamlined usability maximize operational efficiency and accelerate development for network automation. Paragon Automation is open and programmable across all its key applications:
- Intent-based Network and Service Automation
Workflow management, intent-driven service activation, model-driven configuration, provisioning and compliance
- Paragon Active Assurance (Quality monitoring/troubleshooting)
Active service quality testing and measurement on the data plane for WAN, SD-WAN, multi-cloud performance
- Paragon Insights (AI/ML analytics)
ML-driven proactive assurance, predictive analytics, correlation, and root-cause analysis for actionable insights
- Paragon Pathfinder (WAN SDN Controller)
Simplified path and slice creation, traffic optimization, peering engineering, management and assurance
- Paragon Planner (Network Planning)
Planning, modeling, and verification of services before deploying
Integrating assurance into design and deployment
Juniper solution components: Intent-based Network and Service Automation and Paragon Active Assurance
With Juniper Paragon Automation, assurance can be integrated into the design and deployment process to accelerate every step in the service creation and provisioning chain, while automatically testing and validating that every new service meets its intended objectives. By using Intent-based Network and Service Automation for zero-touch provisioning workflows, CSPs also include active testing and SLA validation throughout the process. This accelerates the time-to-revenue for CSPs by provisioning new services faster (for example, customers have seen as much as 95% reduction in service provisioning times). It also eliminates repetitive, effort-intensive provisioning and testing tasks that can lead to manual errors that risk delays in the services rollout (for example, customers have seen reduced OPEX for network operations of as much as 80%). With Paragon Active Assurance directly providing active measurements integrated into the process, customer experience is safeguarded by verifying that services are configured properly the first time and every time; and testing that those services are meeting SLA requirements even before turning them over to customers.
Find out more about accelerating delivery of error-free services that meet SLAs through our Juniper webinar on “Automating Service Activation and Testing”. Register Now.
Embedded assurance in vendor products
Juniper solution components: Paragon Active Assurance and Paragon Insights
A shift-left testing approach is commonly seen in software testing and occurs when testing is performed earlier in the lifecycle. This approach can help overcome key operational challenges that classical assurance solutions cannot. This is exactly what can be better achieved through embedding assurance within the full network vendor supplied network automation stack for the transport domain that supports multivendor IP network equipment.
By leveraging a shift-left testing approach, service assurance can be incorporated earlier in the operations lifecycle starting at the operations strategy, design, readiness and setup phases, as well as during the service activation phase. For example, by building active assurance into operational processes and network automation, customer interaction management, problem handling and QoS/SLA management is simplified along with service problem and quality management. This also has positive implications for business partner problem and performance handling.
To find out more, read our Juniper Blog on how “Active Assurance Improves Network Service Quality”.
Blending active and passive approaches
Juniper solution components: Paragon Active Assurance and Paragon Insights
Juniper Paragon Automation enables a complementary approach that leverages both active testing with Paragon Active Assurance and passive telemetry-based data collection/processing with Paragon Insights. Paragon Active Assurance can actively measure end-to-end service quality on the data plane using synthetic Layer 2 to 7 traffic to mimic real-user transactions and valid SLAs before services are delivered to customers, while corelating the active measurements with passive telemetry-based analytics through Paragon Insights. Paragon Insights then provides deeper intelligence using machine-learning (ML) to power predictive maintenance. In this way, CSPs can proactively measure service quality, network performance and reliability to mitigate emerging issues. Paragon Insights also supports integration of multiple assurance data sources, including from third-party network equipment, passive probes, network analytics, service orchestration, OSS performance management and open-source applications.
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In this first article I delved into many of the concrete approaches to Service Assurance that several leading communications service providers (CSPs) and other ecosystem thought leaders have been working on, to explain how Juniper Paragon Automation is enabling its customers to deploy these approaches into their networks today to realize many benefits including to assure high-quality experiences throughout the service lifecycle.
In “Strategies for Next-Gen Service Assurance in the 5G and cloud era --- [Part 2]”, my next article on this topic, I will discuss four more service assurance approaches including:
- Developing a cohesive data strategy and demanding rich and relevant telemetry from vendors
- Complementing analytics with a Model-driven approach
- Leveraging cloud-based analytics, AI/ML and solution-wrapped AI
- Adopting cloud culture
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AvidThink put it very well in their concluding remarks on “Towards a Zero-touch and Closed-loop Automated World” within their research brief that:
“5G, edge computing, and new business services demand a higher level of assurance than before, at a faster deployment rate than any time in the past. To achieve success in new service rollouts, retain and attract customers through superior experiences, and monetize differentiated services enabled by 5G, CSPs will need next-gen service assurance capabilities.” – AvidThink
Juniper Networks believes that adopting these strategies for accelerating evolution towards next-gen service assurance will be key for profitable network and service operations in the 5G and cloud era.
[Continue reading Part 2 in this two article series.]
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