Telco Cloud vs IT Cloud

Telco Cloud vs IT Cloud

Cloud computing has opened a breath for enterprise and telecom related opportunities to hosting applications and services. While market talk is that somewhere in near future IT Cloud and Telco Cloud will merge to form a consolidated Cloud to serve the customers, however present landscape considers both the Cloud types as different. Telco Cloud commonly refers to a Private Cloud deployment within a Telco/ISP environment that hosts Virtual Network Functions (VNFs) of the Telco/ISP Network utilizing NFV techniques. On the other hand, IT Cloud is related to an enterprise workload and is a private cloud deployment. IT Cloud provides cloud based services to render enterprise requirements.

Related – Telco Cloud Architecture

Telco Cloud commonly refers to a Private Cloud environment to host Virtual Network Functions (VNFs) of the Telco Network by utilizing NFV techniques. On the other hand, VNF functions are not extensively employed in enterprise Cloud.

Further, Telco Cloud is very stringent on secured traffic flow and latency requirements. Delay needs to be very low upto scale of milliseconds. One the other hand, IT Cloud has low latency requirements , however not as strict as Telco Cloud. Moreover, Internet based access is also favored approach for IT Clouds, while Telco Clouds prefer using dedicated Service provider/Telcom Links to deliver Cloud services. In terms of over-subscription ratios, Telecom Clouds need 1:1 ratio for CPU allocation, while IT cloud can bear stealing of CPUs across applications.

With reference to standards, Open standard is the strategic approach for Service provider/Telco Cloud environment, while IT and Enterprise Clouds may employ vendor proprietary technologies.

Related – Public Cloud vs Private Cloud

Comparison Table: Telco Cloud vs IT Cloud

The above stated facts have been encapsulated in below table:

Parameter	Telco cloud	IT Cloud
Terminology	Telco Cloud commonly refers to a Private Cloud deployment within a Telco/ISP environment that hosts Virtual Network Functions (VNFs) of the Telco/ISP Network utilizing NFV techniques.	Related to an enterprise workload and is a private cloud deployment. IT Cloud provides cloud based services to render enterprise requirements.
Application Stack	Telecommunication applications	End user web based IT application
Related terms	BSS, OSS, VNF,NFV, SDN	Multi-tenancy, virtualization, IT workload
Delay / Latency	Very low latency requirements.	Low latency requirements
Throughput	Very High throughput .Port speed are required to be 100G or above	High throughput requirements and port speeds may start from 10G and beyond.
Oversubscription and CPU Allocations	Ratios are typically 1:1	Ratios may vary from 8:1 upto 16:1
Reliability	Very High due to distrusted Data Centres	High
Setup	Distributed Data Centres across locations	Consolidated Data Centers
Strategy	Open Standards	May use vendor proprietary technologies.

Download the difference table here.