Rick Bauer recaps the SDN Solutions Showcase at ONS and gives insight into the next.
The SDN Solutions Showcase was a big hit at ONS2015! We promised you real SDN use cases in action, and we delivered. Those who were able to stop by will likely agree with me that there was quite a buzz in there. Or was that the humming of the racks? No, there was definitely an exciting buzz within the Showcase!
The Showcase was featured front and center at the ONS Expo, making it hard to miss. Of course, the 65”+ monitors helped a bit. We featured 19 demonstrations in six key SDN categories, including network functions virtualization (NFV), data center, carrier WAN, testing, enterprise, and security.
There is growing industry interest in NFV, and that was clear at the Showcase. Many of the demonstrations in this theme area showed exciting virtual network functions (VNFs) that could radically change the way services and applications are delivered.
Data center was also a popular theme, as it showed SDN deployment, orchestration, cloud integration, and gateway management. Great to see so many different demos in this area, including the newly released Atrium distribution.
Carrier WAN was another hot industry theme, showcasing optical networks and how they 
are bringing great gains in performance, cost efficiency, and capability to carrier Ethernet and services.
One area that touches all aspects of SDN is testing. When it comes to SDN, measuring network performance and debugging applications are paramount. The testing demos provided unique solutions to developing insight into network performance in SDN environments.
The enterprise theme was especially timely, as a majority of U.S. businesses are preparing to implement SDN products in the data center by 2017 in order to reduce networking costs. The demonstrations in this theme featured some great solutions deployed to meet their challenges and pain points.
Lastly we had the security theme. Security is an important discussion topic within the industry, and we were excited to demonstrate ways that SDN technologies provide unique defensive capabilities in securing today’s networks.
Summit participants visited all of the demos to see what was on display, asking great questions and learning how the components of these demonstrations came together. We’ve included photos from the Showcase within this post so that you too can get a sense of what ONS attendees experienced.
For many of our Showcase participants, this was the first time these demonstrations were on display and shown publically. Sure, we’ve done Showcases before, but never one with this many participants. It was truly great to see all of these companies coming together in the name of SDN. A big thank you to the companies who participated in the Showcase by donating their time and technology. Without them, the Showcase wouldn’t have been what it was. Another big thank you to the folks at ONS for supporting the event and providing us with a premier location within the Expo.
Now that ONS is behind us, we are planning for our SDN Solutions Showcase at the Layer123 SDN and OpenFlow® World Congress this October in Düsseldorf, Germany. Stay tuned for more information on how you can get involved.
What was your favorite part of the SDN Solutions Showcase at ONS2015? Share with us in the comments below or on Twitter.
- Rick Bauer, Director of Technical Programs
