US headquartered telco Centurylink has declared a leadership position for itself in customer service ‘through the integration of its network and cloud, combined with virtualisation functions.
The firm, who’s brand is best known as a data centre colo in the UK said it is building an end-to-end network platform with software-defined networking (SDN) and network functions virtualisation (NFV) capabilities.
In the coming months, it will deploy virtualised Multi Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) routers and Customer Premises Equipment (CPE).
"CenturyLink is taking its network assets and combining them with our expanded NFV platform and cloud services to create a customizable and dynamic applications marketplace infrastructure that will give businesses near real-time provisioning and more control over their service experience," said Aamir Hussain, CenturyLink executive vice president and chief technology officer.
CenturyLink will virtualise 40 percent of its global IP core network locations by end of 2015 with plans to have full global virtualisation coverage in its IP core network and data centres by 2018.
The company says it built its NFV platform in 36 network and data centre locations in seven countries, with plans to expand into a total of 44 locations by the end of the year. CenturyLink is replacing hardware with software over its recently launched Programmable Services Backbone (PSB).
In February 2014, CenturyLink announced a deal with Ericsson to deliver a next-generation Operations Support Systems (OSS) and Business Support Systems (BSS) and create the support needed for implementing NFV and SDN services.
On the software front the firm runs an app marketplace, uses Pivotal Cloud Foundry as an application development platform and is a founding member of the Open Platform Foundation.
