The Metro Ethernet Forum (MEF) did a pre-launch of MEF 3.0 on Oct 18 and plans to release the MEF 3.0 Global Services Framework at MEF17 on Nov. 14 in Orlando, FL.

“MEF 3.0 is the realization of our Third Network vision. We are excited to advance a new generation of agile, assured, and orchestrated services that will empower users with the dynamic performance required to thrive in the digital economy,” said MEF President Nan Chen. “MEF 3.0 services blend sophisticated, dynamic service definitions with an emerging suite of LSO APIs to provide an on-demand, cloud-centric experience. Further, our new, subscription-based certification brings a whole new approach to how vendors and operators can evolve their standardized, certified offerings.”

So apart from the benefit of subscription-based certification, what does it mean for network service providers and operators and vendors from a technical standpoint?

For one, there are going to be new services types that form part of this new specification, when compared to 2.0 such as SD-WAN,L3-VPN and Wavelength services and possibly some enhancements to the existing ones.

The major change however is the standardization of LSO APIs to translate subscriber intent to service realization, spanning service ordering, fulfillment, performance, usage, analytics and security. So for vendors and operators that already have MEF CE 2.0 certification, while it appears that there would be only a minor effort in enhancing their offerings to MEF CE 3.0 certification based on what is already supported, the major effort would have to be in terms of supporting the management interface in terms of MEF 3.0 APIs. This would appear to be easier for those who already support a flexible and modular management interface.

Further, as the result of MEF’s subscription-based certification, there needs to be a whole new approach and management of how vendors and operators need to provide ongoing access to their standardized offerings by MEF approved lab for certification process, even in the face of enhancements.

At Veryx we are keenly following these developments and look forward to talking to our customers and prospects to exploring how our solutions need to be upgraded to support compliance to MEF 3.0.