Vendors not living up to their green promises – report

• Network operators need to deploy technology that will help them keep power consumption to a minimum
• We asked our DSP Leaders Council for their views on green network issues
• They’re not convinced the vendor community is doing as much as it could when it comes to energy-efficiency measures

As energy efficiency has become an increasingly critical consideration for network operators over the past few years, so the vendor community has ramped up its R&D, product design and marketing efforts to help telcos meet their sustainability and operating cost control targets. But are vendors doing enough?

It appears not, according to the members of the DSP Leaders Council, a forum of leading industry executives drawn from all corners of the digital service provider (DSP) community that was launched last December. We conducted a survey with our 90-plus councillors during April to get their views on a number of green network issues and the results of the survey have just been published in The Green Network Report. 

We asked: ‘In your opinion, are technology developers/vendors doing enough to help network operators improve the energy efficiency of their networks?’

As you can see from the chart, above, only 18% of our councillor respondents believe vendors are doing all they can, while just over half believe vendors are not living up to their promises. A further 31% weren’t sure if vendors are pulling their weight when it comes to minimising power consumption. 

This outcome should cause some concern among vendors, as earlier this year, the DSP Leaders Council identified “more energy-efficient network infrastructure” as the most critical technology development that will affect telecom network operators over the next three years – see Green networks, next-gen OSS/BSS vital to telco developments – report.

This is not to say that vendors aren’t doing anything to tackle power consumption challenges. Major chip designers and vendors have made great strides in recent years to reduce processor power consumption, while the major infrastructure vendors have introduced hardware and software measures to help operators with their energy-efficiency efforts – for example, see Ericsson boasts energy savings at smart 5G site and Nokia and Orange announce extreme deep-sleep energy-power-saving mode.  

It’s just that the council members believe they could be doing more.

As part of our green network survey, we also asked our council members if telcos are doing enough to improve the energy efficiency of their networks, if AI can help, if recycled network equipment should be deployed as part of green network strategies, and more. The 11-page, free-to-download report is available now, along with our other industry reports, the most recent of which have focused on Open RAN and quantum-safe networking. Check out the full selection here. 

- Ray Le Maistre, Editorial Director, TelecomTV