HPE looks to advance 5G developments with vendor neutral offering
Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) has added the Open Distributed Infrastructure Management (ODIM) initiative to its open 5G portfolio.
At its core, the ODIM initiative is designed to simplify network management. It supports large scale, geographically distributed networks and facilitates interaction between disparate multi vendor infrastructure resources.
The HPE ODIM Resource Aggregator models infrastructure elements in every site to simplify infrastructure automation across resources, vendors and geographical locations.
As such it is targeted towards large organisations engaged in managing complex systems. It particularly lends itself to tecos faced with rolling out 5G networks across thousands of sites equipped with IT infrastructure from multiple vendors and different generations of technology.
Significantly, the solution leverages industry defined specifications, including DMTF Redfish interfaces, to enable a vendor-neutral approach for managing configuration and operations of compute, storage and networking infrastructure resources across multiple vendors at scale, the company states.
In fact, the initiative is being launched in collaboration with Intel and with support from key industry leaders including AMI, Apstra, Red Hat, Tech Mahindra and World Wide Technology.
HPE and Intel state they plan to initiate an open source project under the Linux Foundation to further develop the initiative in conjunction with ecosystem partners to enable end-to-end automated management of networks.
Removing vendor lock-in enables 5G to be built with open software, such as HPE 5G Core Stack, running on off-the-shelf IT infrastructure, according to HPE.
HPE states these developments are increasingly important given the current situation, where internet speed is key to business success and longevity.
According to a statement, HPE will launch the commercially supported version of the open source infrastructure manageability function along with associated infrastructure-specific plug-in components in Q2 2020.
The open source release of the Open Distributed Infrastructure Management initiative to the Linux Foundation is also targeted to take place in Q2 CY 2020.
HPE VP telco infrastructure solutions Claus Pedersen says, "5G and Edge Computing industry initiatives will require large scale and geographically distributed multi vendor infrastructure deployments that can only be cost effectively realised with infrastructure-as-code automation.
Pedersen says, "The Open Distributed Infrastructure Management initiative tackles network scalability challenges and the costs associated with vendor lock-in by enabling multi vendor infrastructure deployments, the centralised deployment of standards-based fault and configuration management, and the aggregation of resource-specific status information.
Intel Network Platforms Group corporate VP and GM Dan Rodriguez says, "The ODIM initiative builds upon the work we have done with HPE on top of Redfish and will ultimately help Communications Service Providers and Enterprises discover and unleash the full potential of the underlying technologies in their distributed deployments.
IDC GVP Ashish Nadkarni commented on how HPE's announcement impacts the industry on a broader scale.
Nadkarni says, "This initiative proposes new DMTF Redfish extensions that will provide a path forward for the creation of powerful new software-defined data center paradigms that enable end-to-end network automation.
"This open standards-based initiative offers organisations a way to converge multi vendor hardware resources under a unified infrastructure management solution, promising to accelerate both 5G rollout and innovation across the industry.
