Cloud providers and large enterprises don’t know enough about what’s going on in their networks, according to Nokia.
The networking equipment vendor wants to remedy that by enhancing its products with technologies from U.S. IP network analytics vendor Deepfield, which it has just announced plans to acquire. Deepfield provides real-time information about application demand and data flows that Nokia intends to use to help its SDN (software-defined networks) steer traffic.
Nokia sees Deepfield’s analytics tools as a way to help its customers — including ISPs and telcos, hosting companies and others operating cloud services at scale — to better control and protect their networks.
Indeed, with the rise in DDoS (distributed denial of service) attacks, being able to identify and modify abnormal traffic patterns quickly is becoming more important in maintaining quality of service. Deepfield’s approach is to fingerprint traffic from around 30,000 of the most popular cloud applications and services, and look out for changes in how it flows through networks. Nokia plans to use that information to make changes in its open SDN platforms, including the Nokia Network Services Platform (NSP) and Nuage Networks Virtualized Services Platform (VSP), it said.
The changes will happen in real time, without the need for an operator to intervene, the company said. They will even allow it to control quality of service and application performance on a per-subscriber basis, it said.
Deepfield’s clients include Time Warner and Comcast, and are predominantly in the U.S. where it is based. Following the acquisition, Nokia hopes to sell Deepfield’s products worldwide, it said. The companies expect to close the deal by the end of March.