The key technical challenge for network automation is expensive integration. Even if the same vendor’s solution used in different OpCos, custom integrations made for one OpCo hardly replicable anywhere else.
Figure 3 – Proprietary NMSs for transport services management
Optimization efforts limited to most urgent/important things due to:
- Staff reductions
- Complexity of traffic engineering protocols
- Not much integration between access-backhaul-core-optical management systems
Long-term overprovisioning and reactive optimization are inevitable consequences.