Mike Heffner to discuss role of NFV and SDN in 5G strategies at Network Virtualization and SDN Americas

• Panel: Mike Heffner, VP, PLM, Edge Cloud, ADVA; Phil Harvey (moderator), US news editor, Light Reading; Kazi Ahmed, director, technology, Verizon Wireless; Make Capuano, CMO, Pluribus Networks; Josh Goodell, VP, edge solutions, AT&T; Alfred Rodriguez, business director, wired and wireless group, Xilinx
• Topics: The importance of NFV and SDN to 5G strategies
• When: Wednesday, September 18, 11:55 a.m.
• Where: Network Virtualization and SDN Americas, Dallas Marriott Las Colinas, Dallas, Texas, USA

We’re in the midst of a new supercycle, driven by the increased adoption of white box technology across the service delivery value chain. As a result of this transition, we’re seeing disaggregation of service delivery infrastructure, pushing more functionality toward the edge of the network where the services are consumed. This new solution architecture is being dubbed “edge cloud” and the principal driving force at its heart is network functions virtualization (NFV).

As CSPs accelerate their transition to 5G technologies, they will rely more heavily on edge cloud and NFV solutions to provide agility in service creation and delivery. Vital aspect of 5G networks include the capacity to host virtual network functions (VNFs) from core to edge, the power to add new features, functions and capacity in a cost-efficient manner, and the ability to enable network slicing, which allows network resources to be tailored and scaled to meet the needs of a particular service, independent of the underlying hardware environment.

In this session, Mike Heffner and other industry experts will highlight areas where NFV and SDN are directly enabling 5G services through discussion around specific use cases and success stories seen in the network to date.