NFV/SDN Not Floating Vendor Boats - Analysts

NFV/SDN Not Floating Vendor Boats – Analysts

COMMENTS

Newest First | Oldest First | Threaded View

Page 1 / 2 > >>

kq4ym 11/22/2016 | 1:13:27 PM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? Maybe there's some truth in the idea that " Unless you are a venture capitalist, it's hard to invest in this market." If there's no real clear cut way to a profit in a reasonable amount of time nor a clear profitable firm showing as yet, it does seem that the only way to get investment may be through the VCs who gamble that a small percent of their investments will pay off big time, but don't know which one.

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

Co-Found17286 11/12/2016 | 3:22:01 AM

SDN/NFV is still ill defined So while I agree the success stories are yet to emerge, that may not solely be because of a lack of movement in the space but it mat also be because of a lack of maturity in what is defined as - in particular - NFV. At Content Delivery World in london this week - which I chaired - there was discussion about almost universal testing of 'virtualisation' but there is a clear lack of 'orchestration' maturity. Everyone gets the business case and the idea of microservices, and the value they bring, but it requires significant layer 1/2 changes before they can roll out and at layer 4 there needs to be either a standard way to make all networks dance (perhaps where ETSI and OpenStack are trying to get to) or things have to be task / business case focussed and relatively proprietary - such as my own company services. Indeed we have been doing so since 2009, long before the terms microservices and NFV were introduced and we don't use the terms explicitly because we are cautious about the expectation of interoperability that calling things 'NFV' may bring to our 'virtualised' capability. So it may be that virtualisation of operator networks is far more extensive than perceived but that folks are cautious about referencing 'SDN/NFV' when the terms are still frankly quite ill defined (even though marketing and analysis seems to treat them as if they are precise descriptions).

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

microcaptechinvestor 11/11/2016 | 3:56:35 PM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? Interesting view from industry analysts/investors not reading the tea leaves here. Traditional vendors complaining about CSP capex spend way down. Yet Radcom is in trials with 9 Tier-1 CSPs (for a $200 market cap with $30m revenue run-rate in 2016), while NTCT, ERIC, NOK and others continue to warn about revenue. Radisys is seeing significant traction with DCEngine. Gigamon is accelerating revenue growth, and sold into a Tier-1 CSP for an NFV engagement last quarter.

Winners are beginning to emerge for public stock market investors.

CSPs move slow, and they are moving very carefully here given the magnitude of the shift to cloud architecture. But for those truly disruptive players with "cloud native" VNFs, selling solutions to CSPs in the fashion they want (no proprietary hardware appliances coupled with proprietary software) a tidal wave of orders from the world's largest CSPs could come crashing in. A good problem to have for investors in these stocks!

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

Carol Wilson 11/11/2016 | 11:32:22 AM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? I probably was aware of the AT&T/Radcom tie at some point but it honestly didn't pop up in my aging brain as I was writing this story.

I think there are success stories out there and successes in the making - these financial analysts are looking at the big picture and not seeing the kind of impact that a lot of us thought NFV/SDN would have in terms of bringing smaller innovative software companes to the fore.

It may also be that until there is an infrastructure in place to support VNFs and a process for onboarding them that is more universal, it's harder for smaller software players to make an impact.

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

microcaptechinvestor 11/10/2016 | 4:53:19 PM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? A few private investors are blogging regularly about Radcom.

http://seekingalpha.com/article/4020654-competition-losers-making-radcom-potentially-big-winner

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

inkstainedwretch 11/10/2016 | 4:27:55 PM

Enlightenment sought With a few exceptions (down, Radcom! Down!), small companies haven't been able to distinguish themselves.

We have box companies like Huawei telling their customers they don't want to sell them boxes, they want to provide services. (See Ian Morris' story).

My conclusion from just these two data points is that the big box companies have to develop (or buy) software expertise. Presumably they are doing so. Presumably that would mean that these new companies have to edge out competitors that are much larger, that are already working with customers on hardware/architecture, and that are already in the process of ingratiating themselves further by providing services and software.

So, unless the big box incumbents don't develop software expertise, or utterly fail with the software they supply, what's the opportunity for a new small competitor other than being bought by a big box company?

I'm an outside observer trying to make sense of all this. What do people closer to the business see?

-- Brian Santo

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

Technica56000 11/10/2016 | 3:34:27 PM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? Hi Carol - I'm curious, before the comments to the article were you familiar with the Radcom/AT&T relationship? I'm just trying to get a sense of whether the story of what has transpired between Radcom/AT&T is out there or still mostly under the radar.

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

mendyk 11/10/2016 | 3:30:16 PM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? As everything moves closer to open source, doesn't the "investor opportunity" diminish?

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

Carol Wilson 11/10/2016 | 3:13:06 PM

Re: Lack of investment ideas in NFV space? They are paying attention, I assure you. But they may pay more attention to Radcom now!

And before the Affirmed Networks' folks weigh in, Mike Genovese did mention that company's AT&T deal in his discussion.

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

Founding38712 11/10/2016 | 3:04:56 PM

Radcom NFV vProbes Radcom has NFV SA/CEM and more products in AT&T and not only is it the eyes of the EComp platform its also a key part in AmDocs Orchestration MANO . Furthermore, Radcom in engaged with 9 CSPs and 4 have said are acclerating NFV plans. With AT&Ts very public strong endorsement and strong engagments, this little company is exciting CSPs with both its Hybrid apporach and pure NFV approach to address both current and future needs.

Reply | Post Message | MESSAGES LIST | START A BOARD

Page 1 / 2 > >>