Using VeloCloud’s SD-WAN solution, Deutsche Telekom interconnected its Telekom Innovation Labs’ headquarters in Berlin with its Silicon Valley Innovation Center (SVIC) in Mountain View, Calif., to prototype an agile, responsive industrial network with minimal cost and management impact to existing private networks.
Deutsche Telekom created its SVIC in 2008 to focus on research and development in emerging network and mobile technologies. Located in Mountain View, the center focuses on a number of aspects in Software Defined Networks, including Network Function Virtualization (NFV) and cloud networking technologies. SVIC’s second area of research is on Mobile and IoT, including at the OS, infrastructure, and application levels. SVIC and colleagues in Germany are working at the leading edge of network architectures, including Industry 4.0.
“We were considering alternative network architectures, including setting up Software Defined Networks between Mountain View and Berlin,” said Louis Schreier, Vice President of the Silicon Valley Innovation Center. “However, we recognized that building a separate WAN and VPN network on top of our existing infrastructure would be cumbersome, time-consuming, and very expensive.”
Deutsche Telekom was developing a prototype network that would connect the robotics and 3D printing command center in Berlin with other non-printing robots in other parts of Germany. The goal was to enable 3D printers or robotic arms in Mountain View, or elsewhere, to instantly execute commands issued in Berlin. According to the company, it selected VeloCloud because of its fast and easy deployment; ease of insertion of network services at the edge, in the cloud or in a data center through business policies; and the unique automation and programmability of VeloCloud Cloud-Delivered SD-WAN which translates into WAN agility.
“Within the first week we had the VeloCloud SD-WAN set up,” said Sumanth Sathyanarayana, Research Engineer of the Silicon Valley Innovation Center. “The setup and connectivity were very easy since it is a plug and play solution. We also shipped equipment to the other locations and made similar connections in a very short time. VeloCloud gives us agility through programmability, and capabilities such as automatic WAN link discovery and monitoring eliminate having to configure links and branch locations individually.”
According to Sathyanarayana, with a network powered by VeloCloud for this next-generation project in place, Deutsche Telekom Innovation Laboratories in Berlin and Mountain View were able to validate SD-WAN architectures and capabilities supporting industrial 3D and robotic automation.
“Deutsche Telekom’s pioneering work in next-generation IoT networking and IoT technology is aligned with VeloCloud’s vision for the future of SD-WAN,” said Sanjay Uppal, VeloCloud CEO and Co-Founder. “VeloCloud Cloud-Delivered SD-WAN is the perfect platform to support the next generation of industrial IoT applications and stacks as it provides the secure, real-time and high performance communications needed between sensors and actuators at one end to the applications and analytics in the cloud at the other end. VeloCloud SD-WAN is equally applicable to branch users, mobile devices and the internet of things.”
