So says Stephanie Gibbons, principal analyst for carrier network software at Light Reading sister company Omdia.
Despite the concerns over COVID-19, Gibbons said operators must continue 5G investments, including in SDN and NFV implementations.
Outlook cloudy: Cloud native network infrastructure continues to be vital to 5G.
(Source: Unsplash)
In the report 2021 Trends to Watch: Carrier Network Software, Gibbons said operators are continuing to deploy carrier network software for network automation. Over the last two years, ensuring that this automation provides unified end-to-end management has become critical, she said.
Omdia said that 96% of carriers have either deployed or plan to deploy network functions virtualization (NFV) in 2020, while 50% have deployed or plan to deploy carrier software-defined networks (SDN).