Networking and Infrastructure News Roundup: October 23 Edition

IT professionals are used to change. But we’re living in extremely unusual times. Work from home is likely to extend well into 2021, edge applications are exploding, the move to cloud and cloud-native applications continues, new connectivity options like 5G and Wi-Fi 6 are emerging, and most companies are undergoing a digital transformation.

Keeping up with these changes and the slew of new products and services introduced to support them is a daunting task. Here is a brief list of some networking and infrastructure news of the week to help you navigate the choices.

Accenture announced it will be working with SAP to develop industry-specific solutions based on SAP’s industry cloud. Built on the SAP Cloud Platform and integrated with SAP’s intelligent suite and SAP Business Network, these applications can help companies innovate with new capabilities in the cloud. Accenture has already collaborated with SAP on cloud solutions for the utilities industry, helping clients more effectively manage business processes and improve customer experiences. The two companies are working on additional industry cloud solutions for the retail and consumer products industries. The Accenture Liquid Studio for SAP has also developed more than 170 apps to date that extend the functionality of SAP's intelligent suite and enable new business capabilities using technologies such as analytics, artificial intelligence, blockchain, the Internet of Things, and machine learning, all on SAP Cloud Platform.

Verizon announced it is partnering with Microsoft to create new ways for enterprises to accelerate the delivery of fast and secure 5G applications. The collaboration brings Azure cloud and edge capabilities together with Verizon's on-site 5G Edge, a mobile edge computing platform designed to enable developers to build applications for mobile end-users and wireless edge devices with ultra-low latency. By providing on-site private 5G, businesses will realize increased power efficiencies and reduced costs of end-user devices while helping to address their privacy and security needs.

Aruba, a Hewlett Packard Enterprise company, announced that its Aruba Central cloud-native network management and analytics platform has achieved a formal “In Process” designation with the Federal Risk and Authorization Management Program (FedRAMP). Aruba Central is an AI-based cloud networking solution designed to simplify the deployment, management, and optimization of campus, branch, remote, and data center networks. With this announcement, Aruba Central becomes the first AI-powered solution for unified WLAN, switching, VPN, and WAN cloud infrastructure to undergo FedRAMP certification.

iXsystems announced it has expanded its TrueNAS Open Storage portfolio with the TrueNAS R-Series storage systems and the TrueNAS SCALE Open Source HyperConverged Infrastructure (HCI) software. The new R-Series storage systems include four models designed for maximum density, performance, Open Storage flexibility, and cost savings. TrueNAS SCALE introduces easy-to-manage hyperconvergence based on scale-out OpenZFS.

Alluxio, the developer of open-source cloud data orchestration software, announced the availability of the next major release of its Data Orchestration platform. The new release offers an expanded metadata service, cloud-native deployment, sensitive data management, support for Java 11, and simplified DevOps and system monitoring. It also features a new management console for hybrid and multi-cloud deployments. The console makes it easy to connect an analytics cluster, with engines such as Presto and Spark, with data sources across multiple clouds, single cloud or on-premises using Alluxio.

Filecoin launched its mainnet, enabling people from all over the world to store, request, retrieve and transfer data, independently of privately owned gatekeepers. The Filecoin network is an alternative to costly cloud storage for the data-centric economy, where individual storage clients and storage miners compete for transactions based on price, reputation, reliability, retrievability, and latency. This model allows clients to get the best possible price from storage miners as well as creating an efficient marketplace for miners to operate storage bidding. Filecoin is a completely open-source, decentralized network.

CommScope announced three new 10G solutions, using the latest Remote PHY (R-PHY) and MACPHY Distributed Access Architecture (DAA) technologies. These additions give operators a new range of choices for realizing the advantages of DAA in both traditional segmented and fiber-deep architectures. The original series of E6000n Remote PHY Devices (RPDs), the E6000n RD1322 RPD released last year, and the new E6000n RD2322 RxD leverage operators’ installed base of fiber nodes as the foundation for driving processing power closer to the customer premises. The advantages include better operational efficiencies, simplified headend operations, and a clearer path to virtualization.

If your company has networking and infrastructure news, send your announcements to [email protected].