Advanced Infrastructure

Network Strategy and Roadmap

Organizations today rely heavily on their IT infrastructure for day-to-day communications and business transactions. Having a solid strategy for optimizing that infrastructure, refreshing old technology, and integrating next generation solutions is crucial for cost control and maintaining a competitive advantage. Yet many enterprises lack the resources or expertise to develop such a strategy. The AT&T Consulting Strategy and Roadmap services enable organizations to establish a go-forward plan with the confidence that the solution approach is the best fit for the business. Our work scope is custom-tailored to the needs of your organization, mapping specific technology solutions to business objectives. Key activities and outputs include: capture of business and technology requirements, analysis of alternative technology solutions and recommendations on optimized solutions, as well as tactical and strategic tasks required to meet the desired future state. Technology areas of focus include LAN Architectures (IP Routing Architecture, Layer 2 Switching), WAN architectures (MPLS VPN, IPSEC VPN, and traditional VPN), WLAN architectures, optical architectures (DWDM, SONET), content delivery architectures, and IPv6 and QoS architectures.

MPLS Architecture and Engineering

MPLS (Multiprotocol Label Switching) networks are becoming the de-facto standard for interconnecting remote sites and data centers across the globe. Many customers are transitioning to IP-based MPLS services from traditional frame, ATM and private line technologies. AT&T Consulting has significant expertise in this migration, and in designing large scale, state of the art architectures which leverage IP routing, QoS and multicast as well as experience in planning the transition from legacy circuit-based WANs to IP-based WANs. MPLS represents a unique interconnection technology that relies on IP routing techniques -- not circuit connectivity -- between sites to enable connectivity and application service delivery. This capability coupled with QoS capabilities in the cloud allows customers to effectively flatten and consolidate their networks, and to deliver voice, video, and data services more reliably and cost effectively than ever before. Because MPLS relies on IP rather than circuit connectivity, it is access agnostic, meaning that an Ethernet access circuit at a branch location will allow users to connect to their Data Center applications served over SONET/Frame/ATM access. This flexibility puts a premium on the end-to-end design approach of the WAN environment to leverage IP routing protocols which control traffic flows and ensure survivability and load sharing. AT&T Consulting understands there is constant flux in the enterprise application portfolio and increasing demands on the network, and can develop a proven MPLS architecture and design based on real-world deployments.

LAN/WAN Architecture and Engineering

The architecture, design/engineering and integration of a robust LAN and WAN environment are the cornerstone for effective application service delivery in today’s enterprise environments. However, the proliferation of bandwidth hungry applications and the ever constant requirement for availability and survivability in these areas of the network have put a tremendous strain on IT. These factors coupled with multiple vendors offering new, enhanced, and complex voice and video technology makes it difficult to keep the LAN and WAN environments refreshed, up to date, and ahead of the demands of the business. AT&T consultants work with our customers to develop an optimized and cost effective solution architecture and provide a structured approach to integrate the solution into the network environment. We follow a standard, proven approach that includes the following activities: identification of touch points within the current environment, creation of configuration standards, development of test plans (network and end user), development of integration and migration plans and process for turning over to the operational environment. As-built documentation and knowledge transfer are key deliverables. Design areas of focus are LAN Architectures (IP Routing Architecture, Layer 2 Switching), WAN Architectures (MPLS VPN, IPSEC VPN, and traditional VPN), WLAN Architectures, Optical Architectures (DWDM, SONET), Content Delivery Architectures, IPv6 and QoS Architectures.

Network Assessment

Networks can grow or change exponentially due to mergers and acquisitions, service and geographic expansion, new technology introduction or divestitures. Many times these modifications are made to meet the business demand and do not offer adequate time to fully develop a life cycle strategy for optimized network deployment. Over time this can lead to non-standard, multi-vendor environments that are poorly designed, difficult to manage and maintain, and result in unnecessary costs and suboptimal application delivery. AT&T Consulting provides network assessment services to analyze the network against best practices. Typical outputs include recommendations for enhancing scalability, manageability, availability and performance. AT&T Consultants bring to bear expertise and lessons learned from hundreds of assessments delivered to customers worldwide each year. This offering spans all internetworking aspects of the infrastructure including LAN architectures (IP Routing Architecture, Layer 2 Switching), WAN architectures (MPLS VPN, IPSEC VPN, and traditional VPN), WLAN Architectures, optical architectures (DWDM, SONET), content delivery architectures, and IPv6 and QoS architectures.

Network Application Assurance

Application services are the lifeblood of the enterprise. Whether they are enterprise applications such as SAP, Citrix, HTTP and FTP, or voice and video applications such as VoIP, Telepresence, OCS and video conferencing, the ability for the network to support the performance and availability of these applications is vital to business operations. The AT&T Consulting Application Assurance service helps customers assess and analyze the overall design of the network and readiness associated with bandwidth/capacity planning, IP routing, multicast and QoS necessary to deliver applications in a robust, survivable and scalable manner. AT&T Consulting can profile the network and the applications traversing the network in order to ascertain the demands associated with application service delivery. In addition, we can assess the impact of introducing new applications into the environment by modeling the application characteristics (bandwidth consumption, latency, sensitivity to packet loss, etc.) before the application is introduced into the network.