Juniper Networks outlined its vision, strategy and products for the Cloud Metro – a new category of solutions optimized for metro transformation, sustainable business growth, and powered by AI-enabled, cloud-delivered automation.
Cloud Metro is defined as the “new edge”, where connectivity, edge cloud hosting, and service experience converge. Where as the traditional metro network was understood to be the aggregation layer, Juniper envisions that the new Cloud Metro will need extreme scale to handle gigabit residential broadband, 5G backhaul, and business cloud connectivity. Cloud Metro also needs agility and deep service assurance. To meet these needs, Juniper will deliver a series of high-performance networking systems, powered by AI-enabled, cloud-delivered automation, specifically designed to build next generation Cloud Metro infrastructure.
Juniper’s Cloud Metro systems leverage adaptive power designs as their foundational principle, enabling unused features and Packet Forwarding Engines (PFEs) to be automatically switched off when not in use. A removable modular power shelf design reduces e-waste and extends system lifetimes by accommodating up to 48 times bandwidth growth within the same chassis. The goal is to replace the traditional 3-5 year ‘rip-and-replace’ network lifecycles with 7-12 year lifecycles.
The rollout includes a number of new platforms in the ACX7000 family , which features Broadcom’s switching silicon and Juniper optics, including new, co-developed 400G ZR/ZR+ optics. The ACX7000 series scales from 1Gbps to 345Tbps of total capacity. The highest-end platform could support up to 54 400GE ports. Juniper says it is ready for 800G and 1.6T ports.
Some further highlights:
- Juniper Paragon Automation as a Service provides AI-enabled, cloud-delivered automation, delivering immediate time-to-service value from months to minutes and reduced Mean Time to Know (MTTK) and Mean Time to Recovery (MTTR). Juniper AI-Enabled Device Onboarding-as-a-Service is the first-use case to be launched leveraging Juniper Paragon Automation as a Service, driving real business outcomes by significantly reducing device onboarding times.
- The ACX7000 Family products promise up to 77 percent lower power consumption, up to 64 percent better space efficiencies and 4-7 years longer system lifetime than leading competitive products available today. The portfolio also delivers the industry’s fastest router line card, highest 400GE density and fabric capacity per slot, up to 21.6 Tbps with 54x400GE ports, ready for 800G and beyond.
- Juniper Paragon Active Assurancetest agents are embeddedin JUNOS OS Evolved, available in all ACX7000 models. This turns the cloud metro network into a distributed sensor for assuring user experience proactively which removes the need for additional, standalone probe hardware to be deployed. Additionally, with the new capability of emulating 5G UE/gNB, service providers can now simulate traffic for both the control plane and user plane, ensuring each 5G network slice meets expected SLA.
- Zero Trust Security ⁴ principles and the threat detection, analysis and prevention fundamentals of Juniper’s Connected Security portfolio have been applied throughout the Juniper Cloud Metro solution. Unique cryptographic digital identities are implemented with the Trusted Platform Module (TPM 2.0) across the Cloud Metro IP services fabric, enabling device attestation and RFC-compliant secure zero-touch provisioning (sZTP). In addition, file encryption and MACsec are implemented to protect data at rest and data in transit. This holistic approach to trust is further enhanced by Paragon’s ability to automatically validate the security deployment and operation across a network of ACX7000 devices.
- Juniper Networks 400G ZR/ZR+ optics co-developed to reduce service provider costs by consolidating IP and optical layers with coherent pluggable optics, which eliminates an entire layer of DWDM transponder terminals by integrating 400G ZR/ZR+ Digital Coherent Optics (DCO). These optics fully comply with industry specifications from OpenZR+ and OIF.
“In a world of ‘retro metros,’ Juniper’s new Cloud Metro solution stands apart. Our cloud-delivered Paragon Automation-as-a-Service promises immediate productivity increases for service providers. Instead of building complex, time-consuming ‘DIY’ automation solutions, they are empowered tofocus on assuring service experiences for their customers,” states Brendan Gibbs, Senior Vice President of Automated WAN Solutions, Juniper Networks. “By extending our proven AI solution to the service provider WAN, we can improve productivity for customer operations teams by dramatically reducing trouble tickets and increasing network availability. And our extended ACX7000 Family delivers the most secure, assured, scalable and intelligent Cloud Metro portfolio on the market. This is the answer to service provider needs for a sustainable future for their profits, their people and the planet.”
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