Verizon this week announced it has completed a Network Function Virtualization (NFV) OpenStack cloud deployment across five of its U.S. data centers, in collaboration with Big Switch Networks, Dell and Red Hat.

The NFV project, which began in 2015, created a production design based on a core and pod architecture. Deployments are currently in progress in additional domestic data center and aggregation sites, with international locations to be deployed during the next several months. The design also will be adopted in edge network sites by the end of the year.

“New and emerging applications are highlighting the need for collaborative research and development in technologies like NFV,” said Adam Koeppe, Verizon’s vice president of network technology planning. “We consider this achievement to be foundational for building the Verizon cloud that serves our customers’ needs anywhere, anytime, any app.”

Verizon worked with Big Switch Networks, Dell and Red Hat to develop the OpenStack pod-based design that went from concept to deployment of more than 50 racks in five production data centers in less than nine months.{ad}

The project is based on OpenStack with Red Hat Ceph Storage and a spine-leaf fabric for each pod controlled through a Neutron plug-in to the Red Hat OpenStack Platform. The multi-vendor deployment leverages Big Switch’s Big Cloud Fabric for SDN controller software managing Dell switches, which are orchestrated by Red Hat OpenStack.

The companies worked together to address five key needs identified early in the project: resiliency at scale; no bandwidth bottlenecks; network design flexibility; reduced operational complexity; and integrated security and visibility.

Verizon is a corporate sponsor of OpenStack, a global collaboration of developers and cloud-computing technologists producing an open standard cloud computing platform for public and private clouds.

“Dell’s open networking initiative delivers on the promise of bringing innovative technology, services and choice to our customers and Verizon’s NFV project is a testament to that vision,” said Tom Burns, vice president and general manager of Dell Networking & Peripherals. “With the open-source leadership of Red Hat, the SDN expertise of Big Switch and the infrastructure, service and support at scale from Dell, this deployment demonstrates a level of collaboration that sets the tone for the open networking ecosystem. This is just the beginning.”