During Enterprise Connect 2018 we spoke to Nokia about their latest new release, Session Border Control for large enterprises.
When upgrading large enterprise networks from IP-based systems to cloud capable platforms, organisations encounter a number of challenges. Maintaining security, ensuring quality of service, QoS, and uniting disparate systems and data are just some of those. Nokia aim to alleviate some of those potential issues with a new release for larger enterprise organisations.They have launched a new cloud-native Enterprise Session Border Controller (eSBC).
A session border controller (SBC) is a device, or software platform, that can be deployed in Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) networks to enable signal and media management of the channels utilised when initiating, operating and deconstructing voice calls or other forms of multi-media communications.
Nokia’s software based SBC has been available for over 10 years but only to telephony service providers and carriers. Bryan Davies, Marketing Director for Communications and Collaboration, at Nokia explained why they are expanding the availability of their SBC to large enterprise organisations.
“What’s happened recently with the advent of cloud, it has caused us to take our SBC software and repackage it into a cloud native package. We realised that in a cloud format it was very easy to make it a lot smaller and therefore applicable to the enterprise space. It solves a lot of the problems that the enterprises face in terms of IP communications”
Previously only viable for network carriers or communication service providers with hundreds of thousands or millions of endpoints the new Enterprise Session Border Controller (eSBC) will be suitable for large enterprises with considerably smaller numbers of endpoints.
The Nokia eSBC will act as the gatekeeper of enterprise communications applications. The software is designed to mitigate the risk of cyber-attacks, including DDoS. Nokia were even able to demonstrate the software preventing the adverse affects of DDoS attacks live for us Enterprise Connect last week. As well as enhancing security functions, Nokia eSBC can be used to optimize the use of IP bandwidth for communications and other priority channels. It also delivers and maintains a high-quality IP voice and video experience by using call admission control to prevent network overload, and by simplifying and streamlining communication paths in the network.
Formulated originally to meet the high compliance standards of large communication service providers Nokia eSBC will enable larger enterprises to cost-effectively control, secure and manage media. Although the software is still only viable for the largest of enterprise organisations with thousands of endpoints at the moment, Nokia do have plans to increase viability for smaller organisations in future.
“We are offering it to large enterprises first, so think the fortune 500 companies. That’s where its the right size at the moment. Over the next year we are going to be reducing the minimum possible size to where we are down to 200 endpoints”
In terms of the distribution model Nokia will aim to offer the new solution both directly and in collaboration with selected partners as part of managed service provision. So previously only a viable solution for incredibly larger communication service providers it does appear that Nokia’s innovation will enable eSBC to be an effective tool for large organisations now and to be even more widely available in the future.
