News

Nokia-Accenture Pact Uses SDN for Digital Networking Transition

• By David Ramel
• 04/22/2016

Nokia Corp. and Accenture have entered into a strategic alliance designed to help organizations transition to digital networking with the help of next-gen technologies such as software-defined networking (SDN).

The new Nokia Accenture Business Group picks up on Accenture's previous alliance with Alcatel-Lucent, which was acquired by Nokia. Alcatel-Lucent last year introduced what it said was the first unified SDN platform for the communication service provider (CSP) industry.

"This group will deliver unique value to clients by combining Nokia's leading IP networking software products and services with Accenture's business services, technology consulting and transformation capabilities," the companies announced last week. "The Nokia Accenture Business Group will develop sales and delivery capabilities focused on a combination of Nokia solutions and Accenture offerings."

Those solutions will target five industry areas, including "next-generation enterprise services for CSPs, leveraging software-defined network (SDN) technologies powered by Nuage." Nuage Networks is an SDN specialist also acquired by Nokia.

"Accenture will be Nokia's preferred ally to complement Nokia's software integration and network services and Nokia will be a preferred provider for the customer experience, SDN and network services and solutions that Accenture provides to its clients," the partners said.

Other areas targeted by the new group include: customer experience and analytics; network and business transformation; software-defined datacenter solutions for large enterprises, again powered by Nuage; and next-generation IP and digital solutions for the mining, oil and gas industries.

"Today's pace of technological change, driven by the transition to 5G, the Internet of Things and the cloud, is demanding extraordinary new capabilities from the network," said Nokia exec Kathrin Buvac. "Working with a strong, complementary partner like Accenture enables us to extend our reach to new customers and markets and to truly drive what we consider to be a transformational era in networking. Nokia has the global scale, innovation muscle and end-to-end portfolio to lead this change and, ultimately, to expand the human possibilities of the connected world."