Why we need a federated edge marketplace

This article is an extract from the recently published white paper – Enabling the power of the edge – which was was written as part of TM Forum's Autonomous Networks project area. Learn more about the project here or join it here to be a part of defining fully automated zero wait, zero touch, zero trouble innovative network/ICT services for vertical industries’ users and consumer.

We are seeing an acceleration in the proportion of IT spend shifting towards cloud and Gartner predicts that cloud will make up to 14.2% of the total global enterprise IT spending market in 2024, which is up from 9.1% in 2020. Gartner states that although software as a service (SaaS) remains the largest market segment and is forecast to grow to $111.7 billion in 2021, application infrastructure services (PaaS) is anticipated to grow by a higher margin at 26.6% (see Table 1). The increased consumption of PaaS is “driven by the need for remote workers to have access to high performing, content-rich and scalable infrastructure to perform their duties which largely comes in the form of modernized and cloud native applications.” Covid-19 has certainly accelerated the move towards applications being hosted in the Cloud, and many predict that these new working from home norms are here to stay.

COVID-19 has also shown enterprises the benefits of moving towards cloud-native IT, networks and applications as it not only enables greater agility and flexibility, but also the power to scale up and scale down services when needed as well as helping to ensure resiliency.

Table 1: Worldwide public cloud services end-user spending forecast (millions of U.S. dollars)

To take advantage of this opportunity, we have recently seen a number of CSPs partner with cloud service providers to deliver both cloud and future edge services. In July, IBM teamed up with Verizon Business to deliver 5G and AI solutions at the enterprise edge with an eye towards enabling Industry 4.0. Similarly, AT&T has signed major deals with both Google Cloud and Microsoft Azure. In March, AT&T on its deal with Google stated they are “testing a portfolio of 5G edge computing solutions for industries like retail, manufacturing, transportation that bring together AT&T’s network, Google Cloud’s leading technologies, including AI/machine learning, Kubernetes and edge computing to help enterprises address real business challenges.”

It is not only CSPs who are looking to partner with cloud providers and in March, Amdocs announced a partnership with Google to deliver Amdocs’ operational and business support systems (OSS/BSS) on the Google Cloud Platform. Part of this deal includes developing new enterprise-focused 5G edge computing solutions for various industries in effort to help CSPs monetize 5G networks at the edge.

According to research conducted by Ericsson, it is estimated that only about 15% of the revenue from an edge computing service delivered to an enterprise will come from spending on site access and connectivity. The largest share of the revenue (up to 65%) will come from the application itself and delivering the service to the enterprise. This is why the development of a federated edge marketplace infrastructure is so important to CSPs, so that they can develop and resell their own and partners’ applications and services at the edge and enable new profitable business models. Just as CSPs are moving towards software marketplaces, with the adoption of TM Forum’s Open Digital Architecture, the same approach needs to be applied to applications running in the cloud and at the edge. It is unlikely that CSPs will be able to offer the full edge by themselves, so the ability to partner and deploy and run edge applications across each other’s networks is a critical step forward in CSPs business and technological transformation. A federated edge marketplace would have the potential to transform how service providers partner and sell their capabilities to others, including developers. It would also ensure the scalability of edge applications through their consistent management across the software lifecycle as well as a standardized approach to design, implementation and integration.

Members of the ODA and Autonomous Networks teams have participated in TM Forum Catalyst projects to address the issues of scaling edge applications and ensuring a standardized approach to implementation on CSP networks. The applications they have developed and the blueprints produced pave the way for a standardized approach to a federated marketplace where applications could easily be shared and deployed across different networks and operating in different edge environments.

The EDGE in automation project, which is championed by BT, Orange, TIM, Telus, Verizon, Vidéotron and Vodafone and includes AWS, Hansen and Microsoft as special advisors, showcases edge computing as a service (ECaaS) in a real-world scenario. The team demonstrated how ECaaS can support first responders in emergencies and provide the best performance for all applications during public and private events, rendering them smart venues. The use cases are very different, but both demand rapid, dynamic reconfiguring of network resources and instantiation of applications at the edge to deliver and monetize critical services in a timely way.

The Developer is king! project, which is championed by Globe Telecom and KDDI Research, seeks to help CSPs monetize 5G and edge by looking at two sets of consuming stakeholders: enterprises or other organizations in verticals like education, automotive, healthcare and manufacturing, plus application developers. Globe and KDDI also sponsored a precursor to this Catalyst, Becoming edgy, which provides a blueprint for an edge cloud lifecycle manager, demonstrating how CSPs can implement 5G use cases for enterprise vertical markets quickly and at scale.

The focus on developers in the latest project aims to level the edge services playing field for CSPs. Most developers focus on hyperscale platforms because it isn’t feasible for them to use different tools, processes, platforms and technologies for every CSP and only reach a small audience. But this could change with use cases that require 5G and edge computing.

A federated edge marketplace would enable CSPs to accelerate their IT and business transformation and rapidly allow them to launch new business models and deploy, operate, produce and share applications at the edge. CSPs could quickly experiment with new services and reduce risk by leveraging applications with a standardized integration fabric which are ODA compliant. A federated edge marketplace offers CSPs an unmatched opportunity to go beyond connectivity and deliver enterprise services and applications.