From the vantage point of the Shenzhou Spacecraft, gazing upon Earth’s night sky, the shimmering lights against the “dark arc” depict the bustling cities and the brilliance of modern civilization.
Where there is electric current, there is light, and with it comes impressive industrial civilization. During the evolution from industrial civilization to technological civilization, data flows have brought wisdom and catalyzed the prototype of the intelligent world.
In this era of intelligence, high-speed, stable, and secure networks serve as the arteries facilitating seamless data flow, integrating the real and virtual worlds. This fusion fuels collaboration and innovation, propelling intelligent transformation across countless industries. As such, networks have become as indispensable to our lives and work as electricity itself. The speed at which networking technologies evolve also determines the depth of the intelligent journey taken by industries.
The Mobile World Congress (MWC), an annual stage for network technology innovation, serves as the epicenter for showcasing the industry’s latest advancements. At last year’s MWC, Huawei unveiled its intelligent cloud-network solution, ushering in a new era of accelerated network innovation characterized by simplified architecture, ultimate user experience, streamlined operations and maintenance (O&M), and unparalleled reliability. What groundbreaking innovations will Huawei introduce this year?
01
The World’s Growing Reliance on Network Innovation
In today’s digital and intelligent world, global progress is intricately tied to digitalization and intelligence. The intelligent world operates on a simple principle: Vast amounts of data are migrated to the cloud for processing and computing, while digital applications proliferate across numerous industries, creating a myriad of digital scenarios. Networks, as the foundation of digitization, streamline multiple application scenarios within enterprises, industry requirements of upstream and downstream players, and even information transfer across entire economies and societies.
In 2023, the emergence of AI models brought about stronger generalization and infinite possibilities, bringing more universal value to industrial intelligence and more requirements for network innovation. According to IDC’s Top 10 AIGC Application Layer Trends in 2024, the proliferation of Artificial Intelligence Generated Content (AIGC) technologies will spur explosive growth in intelligent applications. IDC also predicts that more than 500 million new applications will emerge worldwide by 2024, equivalent to the total number of applications over the past 40 years.
Metcalfe’s Law tells us that the value of a network is proportional to the square of the number of connected nodes in the network. In simpler terms, the more terminals that are connected to a network, the more valuable that network becomes. Therefore, as innovations in the AI era show exponential growth, the requirements for networks that transport AI computing power will also increase exponentially.
In addition, industrial intelligent transformation is essentially driving service transformation through rapid innovation. This rapid evolution will accelerate the convergence of new technologies such as cloud computing, AI, and the metaverse. As technologies converge, they need to communicate based on innovative network technologies. Given this, innovative network technologies are fundamental to innovative industries, key to intelligent transformation, and essential new infrastructure for a digital economy growth model.
02
Codependency of Digital Intelligence and Network Technology Innovation
Industrial intelligent transformation hinges on unlocking the potential of data through seamless flow and interaction, with networks serving as the linchpin for data flow and the backbone of digital transformation infrastructure. The symbiotic relationship between industrial intelligent transformation and network technologies is akin to that of fish and water. In turn, the intelligent transformation across various industries has led to a diversity of digital scenarios, which also drive the transformation of network infrastructure.
Take the campus as an example. Based on information technologies and smart applications, the construction of smart campuses integrates resources inside and outside the campus to build a carrier and platform for industrial intelligent development. The value of the smart campus platform is contingent upon seamless networking, superior user experience, and efficient O&M. In recent years, campus networks have gradually evolved from primarily wireless access to wireless networks as the primary enterprise connection, placing increased demands on wireless network technologies. New technologies represented by Wi-Fi 7 will soon become the standard configuration of campus networks.
The future of campus networks will be defined by those who leverage Wi-Fi 7 technology. Addressing the evolving needs of enterprise customers for wireless, application, and O&M experiences will be a priority for network technology innovators like Huawei at the upcoming MWC.
Last year, China unveiled its Digital China strategy. In such a vast country, the innovation of wide area network (WAN) is indispensable. For example, in the computing power scheduling of the East-to-West Computing Resource Transfer Project, WANs can guarantee network quality over thousands of kilometers.
As enterprise customers progress through the critical phase of intelligent transformation, the migration of production systems to the cloud places greater demands on network experience. In addition, the expanding scale of network connections necessitates WAN solutions that enhance the cloud experience. As a leader in the WAN domain, Huawei is set to unveil WAN solutions at MWC, empowering enterprise customers to build networks that converge multiple services with optimal TCO.
For data center networks, a growing number of services require the support of data centers. Enterprises’ digital assets are increasingly housed in data centers, heightening the demand for robust disaster recovery (DR) capabilities. Geo-redundant architectures have emerged to address this need, but they also pose challenges to network transmission capabilities. The industry is exploring DR solutions supporting 400GE to facilitate seamless disaster recovery and service continuity. Anticipation builds as industry observers look forward to seeing the new solutions at MWC.
Amidst a backdrop of escalating network security incidents such as ransomware attacks, 60% of enterprises now utilize public cloud services, with branches directly accessing cloud-based applications. However, branch-level security defenses remain vulnerable. Hence, there is a pressing need to enhance security defenses and threat analysis capabilities to safeguard enterprise and branch security.
03
Network Innovations, Making Digital Intelligence Infinite
As intelligent development reaches new depths, security boundaries are continually tested. The increasing reliance of innovative enterprises on networks exposes them to greater security risks. Regardless of the stage of network technology development, network security must evolve and innovate synchronously. Although a longstanding concern, network security demands fresh perspectives. Many traditional enterprises lack technical teams like those of internet giants as they embark on intelligent transformation journeys, heightening the severity of their network security challenges. In this context, intelligent security solutions integrating AI capabilities, proactively preventing issues, and swiftly addressing threats emerge as preferred choices for industrial customers.
In response, Huawei has released the HiSec SASE Solution, designed to meet these evolving security needs. At MWC, Huawei will further enhance this solution, offering on-demand security capabilities and automatic threat event handling in seconds.
As industrial intelligence burgeons, the challenge lies in intelligently transforming traditional scenarios. This requires networks to carry application innovations in a timely manner. For example, the traffic industry is building smart highways. During this process, services, such as ETC open road tolling (ORT) and vehicle-road synergy, generate a large number of videos and images, which place high demands on the communication bandwidth of data services. In addition, services (such as road network monitoring and data interaction on the vehicle-road synergy cloud platform) require lower network latency, which necessitates innovation in network devices and technologies.
Another example is that many stadiums are undergoing intelligent upgrades. To meet this, Huawei has developed the network digital map for campus networks, unique in the industry. This network digital map enables comprehensive sensing of users, applications, terminals, and networks, creating a powerful 10 Gbps campus network, improving the network experience for audience watching games and staff office working, and maximizing campus management efficiency.
In conclusion, Huawei’s network technologies underpin the scenario-specific industrial innovations of the future. Continuously innovating in networking technologies, Huawei opens up boundless possibilities for the future intelligent world. Committed to building an intelligent cloud-network characterized by cloud-network synergy, simplified architecture, and low carbon emissions, Huawei maximizes enterprise digital productivity and delivers the ultimate service experience to users.
Moving forward, Huawei will collaborate with customers and partners to construct next-generation network infrastructures, supporting the digital transformation of myriad industries. Anticipation mounts as the industry awaits the debut of Net Master, the industry’s first network model capable of delivering a 100-fold improvement in O&M efficiency, slated for unveiling at MWC 2024. What waves will it create in the industry? Together, we eagerly await to find out.