Harmonic unveils cloud-native containerised CableOS

Technology company Harmonic’s CableOS virtualised cable access software is now available as a cloud-native containerised and Kubernetes-orchestrated solution, a move designed to enable new levels of scalability, reliability and efficiency for operators, according to the company.

Containerisation is a way of virtualising services without launching a dedicated virtual machine for each application. Kubernetes is an open-source system for automating the deployment and management of containerised applications.

Building on the CableOS solution’s original microservices software architecture, Harmonic said that the new cloud-native offering will be an enabler of the broader Software-Defined Networking (SDN) and Network Function Virtualisation (NFV) transformation beginning to take hold in the cable industry. The company said that its CableOS cloud-native solution has already been deployed by an unnamed tier-one cable operator.

The CableOS software core can be deployed on either dedicated COTS servers or on cloud compute data centres, natively supporting both centralised hub-collapsed CMTS architectures and distributed access architectures (DAA), according to the company. It said that the new containerised and Kubernetes-orchestrated CableOS solution has been successfully deployed in both of these architectures.

Harmonic will demonstrate CableOS at SCTE Cable-Tec Expo this week.

“Virtualising the CMTS core was our first step toward unleashing a more flexible and scalable cable access architecture — and we are pleased to see this solution deployed by a growing number of global cable operators,” said Nimrod Ben-Natan, senior vice president and general manager, cable access business, at Harmonic.

“Now, through cloud-native support, our CableOS solution delivers a new level of performance and density while enabling operational benefits, such as automated deployment and more granular system upgrades, in the delivery of competitive gigabit services. By aligning the CableOS solution with our companywide cloud-native strategy, Harmonic is leading a powerful new era of growth and efficiency for cable operators around the world.”