Letter From the Editor

By: Tim Young

'You must want to fly so much that you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.’

'You mean to die?' asked Yellow, remembering three other caterpillars who fell out of the sky.

'Yes and no,' he answered. 'What looks like you will die, but what's really you will still live.” 

“Hope for the Flowers”
- by Trina Paulus (1972)

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Change is scary. And tricky.

Carriers face an era of change that is considerably scarier than asking a caterpillar to become a butterfly. Transitioning from a monolithic utility to an agile digital company is more like asking a caterpillar to become a bald eagle. Or asking a water buffalo to become a butterfly.

Nevertheless, digital transformation is on the menu for CSPs, and central to those efforts is network transformation. Whether CSPs decide to try to do it all or are content to offer a stable, fat pipe (an underrated alternative), evolving the network to become more automated, more visible, more agile and more reliable will always be a priority. The network must evolve. It must transform.

In this issue of Pipeline, we tackle the topic of network transformation and evolution. We explore cloud trends with AT&T, examine IoT ecosystem development, look at what's next for SDN with Windstream, explore NFV, and more. We unpack the realities of automation, dive into the complexities of managing and assuring hybrid networks, and look at ways that the millennial generation can support aging network technology. We bring you all that, plus the latest news and opinion from across the industry.

Enjoy,

Tim Young
Editor-in-Chief