Juniper Networks, on Thursday announced that Telecom Italia, a leading infrastructure telecommunications company, offering fixed, mobile and Internet services and solutions in Italy has adopted Juniper Networks MX Series 3D Universal Edge Routers on its service point of presence (PoP) infrastructure.

Juniper's MX Series acts as an edge services aggregation node or ‘Service hub’ for Telecom Italia's PoP infrastructure; the solution will also be used as a universal software defined networking (SDN) gateway to seamlessly connect physical and virtual networks.

"Telecom Italia's selection of Juniper's MX Series to evolve the service PoP will help provide a High-IQ network that is massively scalable and automated to enable rapid service provisioning. We're thrilled they chose to test Juniper Networks Contrail to help create a dynamic services environment", said Mike Marcellin, senior vice president of strategy & marketing, Juniper Networks.

"The integration of Juniper Networks high performance technology as a ‘service hub’ brings increased flexibility to introduce new service features to our customers. We leverage Juniper's expertise to make SDN/NFV technologies the key to shortening time-to-market and improve cost effectiveness", said Paolo Fasano, Data Networks Innovation, Telecom Italia.

Telecom Italia is currently trialing Juniper Networks Contrail SDN and NFV controller with OpenStack to transform its service creation complexity by integrating virtual and physical network functions as well as creating flexible, dynamic service chains.

Juniper's open approach to SDN/NFV networking enables Telecom Italia to integrate physical and virtual network functions from Juniper Networks as well as third party vendors, enabling a true ecosystem of best-of-breed solutions to achieve differentiated services and subscriber value faster and at lower operating cost.

Telecom Italia's "Service hub" is a point of flexibility for inserting physical and virtual appliances. The Contrail technology could be used as an enabler to deliver a SDN model of dynamic service-chaining capabilities including flexibility and improved time to market.