John Roese’s Blog CTO, Nortel

Location: On vacation

In the last few weeks, Nortel has received a reasonable amount of press about our announcement of the Unwired Enterprise initiative. In this announcement, we identified a timeframe on one of the biggest outstanding questions in the Enterprise landscape: “When will wireless technology be sufficient to eliminate the need to wire new buildings and facilities for LAN access?”

The challenge with this question is that the answer is pretty subjective. Five or more years ago, many enterprises began using Wi-Fi as a primary access network in branch offices and remote sites but to this date most, if not all, still fully wire new buildings for wireline access in large sites and campuses. The main reason is that while 802.11 wireless technology is a pretty good technology, it has had to mature to catch up to the security, stability, simplicity and performance expectations of wired Ethernet.

It is our position that, after a decade of evolution, both Wi-Fi and broadband wireless (4G) technologies are getting close enough to the expectations of the customer that we are becoming able to build the Unwired Enterprise from an access perspective.

In security, the wireless security models built around 802.1X, WPA2 and other security standards are actually significantly more robust than those of almost any wireline network. Strong, flexible two-factor authentication and authorization, along with robust protection mechanisms, make a well-implemented wireless network secure enough to meet the expectations of most enterprises for almost any use. Unfortunately, the security model applies only if the end systems support these methods and, as we all know, in the hyperconnected era, the diversity of end points means that additional technologies to support clientless and passive end-point security are still evolving.

In stability, the wireless networks that are emerging around 802.11n are getting pretty good. They have path diversity with OFDM-MIMO, and the adaptability of most Wi-Fi systems allows for overlapping coverage and some basic interference avoidance. Here, we believe there is still work to be done, but much of that work is deriving advanced technology from the carrier wireless world and making the kind of adaptive, advanced RF systems that are expected from cellular networks possible in the enterprise. One of the key focus areas of the Unwired Enterprise effort is this derivation of technology from the carrier wireless world into the enterprise to enhance its resiliency and scale.

In simplicity, again, great progress in making the wireless enterprise easier to operate, but the fact that Wi-Fi is still an overlay and not embedded into a common network creates unneeded complexity. The vision of the Unwired Enterprise is to compress wired and wireless physical access technologies into a common set of networking systems. Embedding the control functions of the wireless system into the switching infrastructure enables a common control plane, fewer components, and an ability to operate the network as a common system from a management and security perspective. To date, there are few embedded wireless systems and even those do not truly unify the overall system design. Clearly, if we are to drive the possible simplicity of this system, a full integration is needed.

In performance, the 802.11n standard is quite good. Using OFDM-MIMO, it allows for very high performance levels when compared to prior systems such as 802.11a,g,b. The challenge with 802.11n is that, as a classic Wi-Fi technology, the implementation is usually simplistic in that the system is designed for optimal coverage and then lacks an ability to adapt as the environment changes. What is understood in the cellular space, on the other hand, is that the environment is quite complex and requires systems to adapt to that diversity and complexity to maintain a predictable coverage and performance model. The Unwired Enterprise needs the adaptability of the cellular systems’ RF experience but at enterprise economics.

As you can see from the above, the Unwired Enterprise is almost upon us, but it will need a focus and expertise from the carrier wireless world to finally achieve reality. Because of the expertise Nortel has in this area, we are taking a pretty bold stance and have now told the enterprise market that we are focused on closing these final gaps. When that is done, the enterprise CIO will, for the first time, have a legitimate choice about how to provide primary access connections pervasively. The options will include: traditional wired; wired with wireless options; and now, for the first time, wireless only.

This is great for mobility and productivity from a customer view, but it is also an inflection point that can force a re-thinking of the enterprise LAN architecture. That is something that happens very rarely but, when it does, the market can be remade and the vendor landscape can be transformed. This is consistent with our overall posture of transforming the enterprise.