End-to-end automated telco cloud workflows are critical for driving 5G value

Operators need to achieve a return on the substantial capital investments that they are making in their 5G networks. Mobile consumer broadband revenue is only part of the 5G ROI; to justify their outlay, operators are also pinning their hopes of new revenue on the enterprise market. The promise of the 5G network is that it will spur an explosion of connectivity-enabled, innovative enterprise use cases that will drive a new Industry 4.0 era with high levels of industrial productivity. Cloud-based 5G networks that can be customised for specific enterprise use case requirements are critical to achieving the Industry 4.0 vision.

The cloud’s built-in automation capabilities enable mobile network functionality to be onboarded, deployed and scaled in flexible and agile ways to support new Industry 4.0 services. The cloud-driven automation of the 5G network is the second key to unlocking the value of a 5G network. Cloud automation reduces the cost of managing virtualised and cloudified mobile networks and ensures that operators can cost-effectively provide and monetise thousands of individual enterprise network slices.

This perspective outlines the challenges that operators face in building cloud-native network automation for 5G networks and argues that without appropriate tooling to address these  challenges, operators will find it difficult to create customised enterprise services in a timely, cost-effective way. 

This report includes discussion of the following topics

• Telco cloud automation is critical to realising the full value of 5G networks
• Workflow management is a key facilitator of telco cloud automation
• Cloud-based automation is essential for driving value from 5G networks
• Mobile networks are central to value creation beyond broadband connectivity
• Telco cloud and cloud-based automation are critical enablers of new revenue and cost reduction
• Simplifying the automation of a telco cloud environment is a key operator concern
• The fragmentation of telco cloud automation poses challenges for operators
• Operators need a way to streamline telco cloud automation end-to-end
• Requirements for a telco cloud end-to-end process automation solution
• Operators need a centralised platform to create and manage automated telco cloud workflows
• The benefits of a centralised telco cloud workflow management platform