Service delivery platform: Cloud Vendor Delivery XaaS requirements

The service delivery platform (SDP) was born with the need to quickly create advanced multimedia services: IPTV, mobile video, gaming, location-based Services (LBS). But is there a service delivery platform role in cloud computing? It may be, but they are by no means the service delivery platform we recognize today. To maintain the relevance of cloud computing service providers, the service delivery platform must evolve accordingly.

Decades ago, the primary service of the network was voice communications, and the service was embedded in central and vertical switches. With the development of network services and becoming more and more software based, this single model has also been forced to change; even before the advent of the Internet, the standard working Group worked on how to define managed computer intelligence roles in network services. These efforts have also contributed to the development of service delivery platforms.

The root of the service delivery platform is the traditional voice service, which is now the most visible of the SDP in mobile voice services, and functions like a host of IP multimedia subsystem components. However, the future of the service delivery platform is more likely to be pinned on two next-generation technologies: OTT content delivery and cloud computing. The combination of OTT and cloud computing forms a consortium called XaaS, meaning that everything is service or everything, and this definition reveals the inevitable direction of the development of the service delivery platform.

Why XaaS need service delivery platform

The XaaS model assumes that vendors will increasingly deliver next-generation services to mobile devices. The data transferred to these devices will come from different sources, and the bodies that handle the computing resources may be distributed. However, supporting this model requires simple Internet connectivity with optimal performance, and any failure of any component that supports this Internet connectivity will lead to a general failure of the service, a reality that will be a blow to customers.

Reliability is the primary factor in supporting XaaS applications, which includes everything from the network to the application components, and the services provided by the vendors must ensure that users are satisfied and that vendors can be profitable. Given these requirements, the service delivery platform may be an ideal platform for XaaS. The service delivery platform itself has a much higher availability design requirements than the traditional server, and its construction process also needs to meet the high reliability requirements of the signal in telecommunication service applications.

Most service delivery platforms use open platforms such as Linux, UNIX, or related derivative operating systems, most of which are theoretically equipped with cloud computing software and support network-compliant interfaces. The only thing the service delivery platform lacks today is a clear concept of a network service that is aligned with a clear concept based on conversational services such as VoIP and IMS. IMS does not seem likely to produce a competitive platform for network services, and if the service delivery platform is to be a competitive selection object for ordinary servers, they must significantly improve the capabilities of the basic server or cloud computing servers.

Service delivery platform in XaaS: Application store, certification or business process?

To date, the market has identified three applications for the core value benefits of the service delivery platform: Application store Development, certification of functionality and service elements, and service flow throughout the element composition.

App stores are very keen to provide services to vendors because they have a market associated with their mobile device deployment and are connected to their billing processes. While it is possible to host app stores to standard servers like Google and Apple, network operators face a proposition that requires a higher level of reliability, which is enough to justify the value of the service delivery platform. The problem is that the App Store is just an application, and it's not the foundation of the service architecture.

Authentication is a potential and more attractive step in the development of the service delivery platform to the XaaS platform. The certification platform is responsible for managing the elements of the service network, including software, servers, and databases, which are not part of the traditional network management and network Operations Center tools. The service delivery platform can be deployed in parallel with traditional servers to ensure the availability and normal functioning of these devices, allowing for higher levels of monitoring services to run. However, even in this task, the service delivery platform is located outside the service itself, which ensures the availability of resources, but does not ensure that they are involved.

Business processes are likely to consolidate the role of the service delivery platform in XaaS. In an online service, a business process is an organic combination of service and experience across a service component, between components, and in a moving ordered link between requests and responses. Business processes differ from certifications, which focus on usability certification, which actually creates a service or experience, which means building what the user sees and buys is very important.

Business processes also address the potential challenges of building complex, component-based applications, which is exactly what XaaS needs to create in the first place. A service delivery platform business process services can prevent a single component from failing by simply monitoring to ensure that requests sent to components generate a response, or when a request is not properly reacted to a failover plan. This means that more Web servers will be able to participate in XaaS without overwhelming risk of failure, which is mostly common in multiple service deployment applications.

When used in business processes, the service delivery platform can serve as the host for the service component, which is the most important factor in XaaS, and is necessary for integrating high-availability network or BSS components. Business processes are the future of service delivery platforms, and most service delivery platform vendors now acknowledge this in their marketing materials.

Service delivery platform for business processes: There are many obstacles on the way to development

The challenge is to organize the business process itself and standardize the business process itself, which has been tried and done in the past few years, but with little progress. Most service delivery platform vendors offer business process tools, but these platforms are still very complex and expensive, making them uncompetitive in the XaaS real world.

At the same time, the work of business processes in more general cloud computing and server markets is ongoing, especially around DevOps and application integration. Some manufacturers have also gained leadership, including Alcatel-Lucent, Cisco Bae, Dell, HP, IBM, Microsoft and Oracle. If the service delivery platform is to remain relevant, it must go to the foreground of these activities.

The service delivery platform must also address the contradictions associated with mobile network services outside of IMS. In addition to defining a series of sessions, many of the IMS vendors have declined to define services. If this hinders the progress of the support service delivery platform business process, it may downgrade the service delivery platform to a SoftSwitch application and reduce its relevance in the XaaS-driven future.

(Responsible editor: The good of the Legacy)