Promoting Platform Strategy to Improve Technical Competitiveness

An interview with Wang Xiaoming, President of ZTE’s Central R&D Institute

Faced with increasing competition in recent years, ZTE has been promoting its platform strategy to rapidly respond to customer needs. As an important product of this strategy, ZTE’s 3G platform has improved remarkably on the technical competitiveness that has led to its market success in the 3G era. In September 2009, ZTE launched its ZXR10 T8000 cluster core router used for supporting the flat, large-scale IP bearer networks of leading service providers. According to the firm Current Analysis, the new router architecture enables ZTE to compete in the super core space alongside major market shareholders, and will significantly impact the IP core router market. Recently, Wang Xiaoming, President of ZTE’s Central R&D Institute was interviewed by journalist Fang Li. Wang introduced the achievements of ZTE’s platform strategy, and discussed the impacts of technological advancements, such as the Internet of Things and Cloud Computing, on core networks.

Achievements of the Platform Strategy

Journalist: ZTE’s R&D department has been promoting its platform strategy in recent years. What have been some of the achievements of this strategy, and what is its future plan?

Wang Xiaoming: Since we first implemented the strategy, we have developed several company-level platforms covering hardware, software, data, network management, algorithms, and operating systems. These platforms have been widely applied to the development of various products, and have produced good results. First, they have helped improve the efficiency of our product R&D. We adopt our mature platform components to significantly speed up the R&D process and the quality of our IMS products. This enhances our ability to rapidly respond to customer needs. Second, they help enhance our product capability. It took only three months for our multimedia platform to work with CDMA infrastructure equipment and mobile terminals to improve the quality of voice and video calls. Third, they help reduce costs. We have developed our own operating systems, so we don’t have to rely on outsourcing operating systems. This avoids third-party risks and saves money.

In the future, we will continue to carry out our platform strategy. By following the industry benchmark and introducing more innovative ideas and technologies, we will further integrate and optimize existing platforms, expand their applications, and continually improve our product competitiveness.

J: ZTE recently launched its ZXR10 T8000 series cluster core routers. These represent great achievements of the platform strategy. What technical breakthroughs has ZTE made in its T8000 products?

Wang: The semiconductor chips at the heart of ZXR10 T8000 were developed independently by ZTE and set new industry records for highest processing capacity, best integrational capability, and best access capability. We have also achieved three critical breakthroughs in core chip technology: advanced high-speed routing forwarding, large-capacity packet switching, and complex traffic management. The ZXR10 T8000 is the first high-end router in China to use proprietary chip technology. It adopts scalable component-based software architecture that enhances product flexibility, availability, and reliability.

Moreover, the ZXR10 T8000 overcomes performance bottlenecks of previous-generation routers. It provides a cluster switching system that supports 80-chassis clusters, with a maximum switching capacity of 240Tbps; it provides a high-performance forwarding engine that supports 40G wire-speed forwarding (40-byte packet size); and it provides a rapid route convergence time of less than 500ms.

The ZXR10 T8000 series is based on our early 3G platforms and operating systems. At the start of product development, we attach great importance to platform planning and making platform-based technical components. This provides a platform basis for product research and development in the field of data communication.

J: Another important achievement is the 3G platform. Could you tell us about the R&D of 3G platform products?

Wang: The V3 platform was our earliest 3G platform. With an all-IP, dual-plane, distributed structure, the platform was widely applied to various ZTE products. In 2008, we launched a high-availability V4 platform based on ATCA standards. The V4 platform using middleware technology has been adopted by a number of operators to support various products. We are now developing a new 3G platform that will integrate computing, storage, and networking. It will be used in Cloud Computing, CDN, and some IT applications.

Internet Oriented Next-Generation Core Networks

J: What is ZTE’s plan for the future evolution of core networks?

Wang: Voice services will still consume a significant portion of operator revenue for some time. However, with the increase of Internet services, next-generation core networks need to be Internet oriented so that operators can succeed in the Internet era while satisfying requirements for low TCO and energy conservation.

More specifically, we will keep optimizing voice networks by improving their QoS and reliability, and reducing their TCO and energy consumption. We will integrate both voice and content switching functions in future core networks, and provide flexible and expandable network infrastructure to better adapt to changes in service provisioning and traffic flow. For example, a flat network structure can significantly improve network performance and reduce operator CAPEX and OPEX. Intelligent gateways will allow users at the network edge to access feature-rich services. This will improve user service experience and help operators streamline their service operations. We also intend to enhance equipment sharing and self-organization, and introduce virtual and distributed self-organization techniques to reduce TCO and energy consumption. By introducing the concept of Cloud Computing into the field of core networking, we will create new business models.

Of course, the evolution of core networks has many uncertainties, but the general objective is clear:  to build an Internet-oriented next-generation network platform featuring greater flexibility, cost-effectiveness, easy management, and low power consumption. We will monitor the latest developments in this area, and provide a platform architecture with optimized control plane, media plane, and packet processing for core networks. In this way, we can meet operator needs and gain a competitive edge in the evolution of future core networks.

Meeting the Challenge of New Technological Advancements

J: What are the impacts of Mobile Internet and the Internet of Things on core networks?

Wang: Mobile Internet is developing towards open broadband, which is consistent with the development trend of the Internet. The major difference between the Internet and Mobile Internet is their different requirements for terminal capability and mobility.

Due to high traffic in the Packet Switched (PS) domain, core networks tend to have a flatter structure. To cut down high backhaul costs, splitting and edge content caching techniques will be widely employed. Also, due to the increasing number of wireless broadband terminals, terminal adaptation requirements will be placed on core network; for example, the requirement for Triple Screen (or converged IPTV, Internet, and Mobile) service. 

The impact of the Internet of Things on core networks has two important aspects: one is the management of great amounts of terminal IDs, the other is the support of equipment with low power consumption. We have products and platforms ready to address both these issues.

J: How will ZTE innovate with its technologies and platforms to meet the challenges of new advancements such as the Internet of Things and Cloud Computing?

Wang: The Internet of Things is still based on the Internet, except that it extends the network terminals from people to things. The emergence of the Internet of Things poses much higher requirements on the addressing space, network performance and capacity, and ID management of the Internet—especially Mobile Internet. IPv6 significantly expands the addressing space of the Internet, and solves the problem of IPv4 address shortage. ZTE has considered IPv6 as strategically important. We have incorporated IPv6 as a basic platform capability so that products developed on these platforms can support IPv6.

We have also been committed to improving the capability and performance of our data products. Our ZXR10 T8000 adopts brand-new software and hardware architecture featuring large capacity, high performance, rapid route convergence, high availability, and high reliability. Its maximum switching capacity is 240Tbps. Moreover, the Universal Subscriber Profile Platform (USPP) serves as a large-scale ID management database that manages hundreds of millions of subscriber profiles and supports Internet of Things applications.

Cloud Computing is different from traditional server-based hosting. This places new challenges on our business and R&D departments. The physical basis of Cloud Computing still rests on having plenty of universal hardware and software devices. Our hardware and software platforms—characterized by universal application, flexibility, ease of management and low power consumption—are quite suitable for the Cloud Computing environment. We are currently developing a new Cloud Computing-oriented platform that integrates computing, storage and networks.