WHITE PAPER

A Scalable and Intelligent Packet

Core Infrastructure

Juniper Networks Solutions at the Transport, Control, and Service Planes

Copyright © 2009, Juniper Networks, Inc.

WHITE PAPER - A Scalable and Intelligent Packet Core Infrastructure

Table of Contents
Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Forwarding Plane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Control Plane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Service Plane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
About Juniper Networks. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Table of Figures
Figure 1: Juniper Networks high-level NGN architecture. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Figure 2: Scalable performance in multiple dimensions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Figure 3: Simple steps to upgrade a T640 to a T1600 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Figure 4: T Series versus the competition in capacity, space, and energy efficiency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Figure 5: A decade of energy efficiency improvements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
Figure 6: Shared versus independent control plane . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Figure 7: The many players in service-aware business models . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Figure 8: Applications made possible by Juniper Networks products on the three planes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

ii Copyright © 2009, Juniper Networks, Inc.

 WHITE PAPER - A Scalable and Intelligent Packet Core Infrastructure

Executive Summary
This paper is essential reading for business decision makers (up to the CxO level) in both service provider and large
enterprise environments. The paper describes a unique solution set for the forwarding, control, and service planes
of service provider networks, in particular core networks but also edge and large enterprise networks. The paper
makes its case with critical points for technical decision makers to consider, as it describes a unique architectural
approach wherein the forwarding, control, and service planes of a network are built and scaled independently of each
other. All of this can be customized to the degree required by individual providers, their customers, and the services
they offer.
The products described in this paper are designed to fulfill and integrate the requirements of each layer. Juniper
Networks® T Series Core Routers, the Juniper Networks JCS1200 Control System, Juniper Networks JUNOS®
Software, and the Partner Solution Development Platform (PSDP) constitute a scalable forwarding plane, control
plane, and service plane. Each layer scales independently, yet can be integrated to the appropriate degree needed
by the application. For instance, JCS1200 is a control plane option for the T Series, and the software tools from the
PSDP can be integrated with primary routing engines or on JCS1200.
Furthermore, a PSDP-based network design can be made proprietary and commercially unique, providing
differentiation for service provider offerings that has not previously been possible.

Introduction
Network scalability and intelligence are defined and measured across multiple dimensions, and competing telecom
products often come in various flavors and combinations of intelligence and scale. Long recognized for its history
of network innovation, Juniper Networks pioneered the industry’s only open three-layer model of the Next-
Generation Network (NGN) architecture, where network scalability and intelligence are based upon independent and
autonomous planes:
• Forwarding (packet transport)
• Control (user and service policies)
• Services (complex packet manipulation)

JUNIPER NETWORKS NGN VISION

Service
OPEN

Control

OPEN

Forwarding

Figure 1: Juniper Networks high-level NGN architecture

Unique and innovative in its simplicity, Juniper’s NGN model is based on the idea that all three planes are
independent and can be scaled at will. Implementers can forego the legacy practice of dealing with discrete,
nonintegrated products with fixed intelligence-to-scale ratios, and can proceed quickly to the ultimate goal—network
efficiency, profitability, and adaptability. This novel NGN principle allows the core network design to stay relevant
regardless of its starting point.
Another key innovation is the open nature of inter-layer interfaces. Think of a multiservice network as a three-
dimensional network stack in the following dimensions:
• Forwarding (“how you move the bits”)
• Control (“how you direct the bits”)
• Software/service (“how you monetize the bits”)

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Unlike competing NGN designs, the Juniper Networks architecture does not lock providers into fixed rule sets
based on what they first need to build. An initial customer focus on forwarding capacity, control plane scaling, or
rudimentary services can be quickly shifted or expanded in response to changing business conditions.
Juniper Networks T Series Core Routers and Juniper Networks TX Matrix products constitute a scalable forwarding
plane, while JCS1200, and JUNOS Software create the scalable control plane. Services hardware and software
support the service plane—all operating and scaling independently. This three-dimensional architecture (Figure 2) is
augmented with the Partner Solution Development Platform (PSDP), which provides a complete toolset for creating
custom and innovative applications, and servicing emerging business models. Even more importantly, a PSDP-based
network design can be made proprietary and commercially unique.

Control: JCS1200
Forwarding: T1600
DP
PS
e:
ic
rv
Se

Figure 2: Scalable performance in multiple dimensions

Forwarding Plane
In the forwarding plane, traffic growth is the key driver of the core router market. As the global economy becomes
increasingly networked and dependent upon the communications infrastructure, traffic rates continue to
balloon—growing 70 to 80 percent a year by most estimates—and high-density core routing remains critical to a
next-generation build-out. With both Telcos and multiple service operators (MSOs) beginning the migration to video
delivery solutions, there will be a continued emphasis on higher capacity and more intelligent core and edge router
deployments.
From a technology perspective, progress in core routing means keeping up with traffic growth, and having a plan
to continue scaling the core. Maximizing interface density is key to this process, and provides a practical measure
of engineering design. Greater density, combined with increasing slot capacity, means a similar-sized chassis can
handle more throughput; service providers can thus more easily plan their growth without the concern of running out
of power or space.
In addition to improved interface density, a multi-chassis architecture is the second strategy to scaling core routing
platforms. While most service providers prefer to follow the technology curve and upgrade as soon as the next
generation of routers comes along (mainly because of improved efficiencies such as higher capacity, better footprint,
and lower power), Juniper’s multi-chassis solution allows providers to grow node capacity either to bridge between
generations, or to build multi-terabit nodes.
Another requirement for forwarding infrastructure is high availability. For example, it is important that hardware and
software upgrades can be completed in-service with no disruption in the network, allowing services providers to add
capacity incrementally with growth in bandwidth demands. The following diagram shows the unique simplicity of the
in-service upgrade of a Juniper Networks T640 Core Router to a Juniper Networks T1600 Core Router.

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 WHITE PAPER - A Scalable and Intelligent Packet Core Infrastructure

3. Swap Face Panel

2. Swap Switch Interface Boards

• Five SIBs per chassis, can run on four
• Disable a SIB, swap it, and re-enable
• Repeat four times

1. Swap Power Entry Modules

• Two PEM per chassis but system can
run on one
• Disable, power off first PEM, swap it,
and turn the power back on

Figure 3: Simple steps to upgrade a T640 to a T1600

Service providers can upgrade existing T640 routers to T1600 without disrupting service or changing customer-
facing interfaces; both platforms operate the same consistent JUNOS Software, and there is no operational impact.
The result is a gain of over 200 percent in throughput with only 40 percent more power and no loss of service. The
approximate time for this upgrade is 90 minutes and the factual energy efficiency improvement (normalized to
payload) is over 30 percent.
Juniper Networks T1600 Core Router, the highest density core router on the market, currently supports 1.6 Tbps in
a half-rack form factor, with 100 Gbps per slot. State-of-the-art programmable ASICs deliver the most sophisticated
packet processing in the market today, highly granular quality of service (QoS), and hundreds of thousands of
filtering operations at highest line rates.
Figure 4 illustrates Juniper’s market lead in capacity, space, and power efficiency.

7 Ft Custom
Rack
10,000
Watts
1.6 5,000
Terabit Watts
1.28
Terabit

25% 50% 50%

More Capacity Smaller Less Power

Figure 4: T Series versus the competition in capacity, space, and energy efficiency

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This unmatched degree of efficiency is attained by Juniper’s state-of-the-art, in-house, silicon development process
and industry-leading software design. The importance of this work is best highlighted as the ability to maintain
flat operational expenses in spite of rising energy costs and increasing capacities and feature sets. Today, Juniper
Networks is shipping its third generation forwarding-plane ASIC, and is consistently surpassing the competition with
every design iteration (Figure 5).

163
170.0
160.0
150.0
1 st Generation 2 nd Generation 3 rd Generation
140.0
Slot 3 Gbps Slot 3 Gbps Slot 3 Gbps
130.0 System 40 Gpbs System 40 Gpbs System 40 Gpbs
120.0 ASIC 180 nm ASIC 180 nm ASIC 180 nm
Power 1.5 KW Power 1.5 KW Power 1.5 KW
EER (Gbit/s/KW)

110.0
100.0
80.0
71
70.0
60.0 Competition
50.0
40.0
30.0
20.0 13
10.0
0.0
1998 2000 2002 2004 2006 2008

Figure 5: A decade of energy efficiency improvements

Control Plane
As mentioned earlier, the forwarding capacity of routers continues to increase at a very fast pace—with single
chassis routers now in the terabit range. However, when product comparisons focus only on forwarding capacity, the
importance of the control plane is often overlooked. Yet a router’s control plane must scale to accommodate ever-
growing routing and forwarding tables, service tunnels, virtual networks, and other information related to network
construction and its optimal usage.
The importance of control plane scale magnifies in modern converged infrastructure. Service providers are called
upon to deliver innovative capabilities to multiple customer segments. Delivering varied services concurrently across
a converged IP/MPLS infrastructure means that any individual service may contend for a fixed amount of control
plane capacity on any individual router.
Enabling an infrastructure’s control plane to scale independently from its forwarding capacity eliminates this
restriction, and provides a control plane multiplicity (separate control plane per service) that enables services,
virtualized networks, and forwarding capacity to all grow separately. This greatly increases flexibility and sharply
reduces risk for service providers, and thus represents the next logical step in the evolution of routing technology. In
essence, this concept of “virtual service networks” delivers on the promise of network convergence by decoupling
services from the infrastructure that provisions them.
Figure 6 illustrates the contrast between the use of a shared and an independent control plane. By separating tight
coupling between the control and forwarding planes of a router, Juniper allows each to have new degrees of freedom
to scale and innovate. This provides ultimate flexibility in a network build-out. Service providers can now scale
customers, sessions, and services on the one hand, and traffic on the other, and neither control nor traffic scaling
will be dependent on the other.

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Shared Independent
SVC 1 SVC 2 SVC 3 SVC n SVC 1 SVC 2 SVC 3 SVC n

Control Plane CP1 CP2 CP3 CPn

Juniper Control System

Forwarding Plane Forwarding Plane

Router Router
Stability Processing
Requirements Scale
Stability

Scale
Processing
Requirements

SVC 1 SVC 2 SVC 3 SVC n SVC 1 SVC 2 SVC 3 SVC n

Figure 6: Shared versus independent control plane

With a legacy shared control plane design, as new services are added, the processing requirements increase and the
likelihood of one service affecting another also increases; therefore, the overall stability of the system, and hence the
service network, may be affected. For instance, if you have an IP VPN service, a virtual private LAN service (VPLS),
and an Internet service running on the same router, the routing tables, service tunnels, and other logical circuits are
scaled together and at some point will combine to reach limits that each would not reach alone.
Another key limitation of the legacy control plane design is the sheer speed of the service rollouts (or the lack
thereof). When introducing new services in a shared control plane environment, one needs to perform careful
compound scaling and regression testing—in both the lab and in the field—to determine how services are affecting
each other.
In practice, this is rarely feasible, as the existing services (and associated revenue) cannot be put at risk. As a result,
legacy networks tend to grow with overlays, where new services are rolled out in separate subnets and each adds
new hardware. In a large service provider environment, even personnel can be specialized in a single service type.
This model carries a high capital and operational cost.
With an independent control plane—such as Juniper Networks JCS1200 Control System—assigned to each service
(or groups of services), the risk in rolling out a new service is greatly diminished. The scaling and stability constraints
of any individual service do not affect the others, and the processing requirements remain stable.

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Service Plane
With the advent of content, application, and handset providers—all providing services and traffic that traverse
backbones—service providers need to negotiate on technical and business levels to capture value from the tidal
wave of traffic that is washing over the core from the edge. Service-aware business models are still evolving in the IP
world, and Figure 7 depicts the complex interactions between the different players.

Handset Application
Provider Provider

Infrastructure Service
Vendor Provider End-User

Content
Provider

Figure 7: The many players in service-aware business models

The requirements of an increasingly disparate and global marketplace are creating pressure for greater network
innovation and a much deeper integration between applications and the network. As the economic pressure to
quickly deliver new products and services grows, business innovation is evolving from traditional transport-oriented
networks to highly integrated solutions requiring deep packet manipulation.
Traditionally, complex packet processing has relied on discrete (nonintegrated) hardware infrastructure, which
prevented economical and flexible scaling. In addition, the level of expertise of conventional equipment vendors in
creating and enabling new deep packet services, (targeted marketing, customer profiling, real-time virus protection,
and many others) has been traditionally lower than that of independent solution providers.
Both of these problems are addressed in Juniper Networks unified NGN infrastructure. Not only is the services plane
fully integrated within the core routers to allow for flexible and economical scaling, but it can also be controlled from
third-party applications, thus combining best-in-class silicon with the subject-specific expertise of independent
solution developers. Fully decoupled from forwarding and control planes, the services infrastructure can be designed
and scaled to specific blueprints of custom network design.
Created to stimulate this cooperative model, Juniper Networks Partner Solution Development Platform (PSDP) has
many components to drive innovation on the service plane and to implement these new business models. The PSDP
offers a powerful set of resources that include a software development kit (SDK) with intelligent and secure interfaces
to JUNOS functions on both the control and data planes. These tools provide customers and partners with greater
choice and control in designing, developing, and deploying specialized applications for the network.
The following table lists some of the tools at each layer of the model that will provide the basis for exciting next-
generation applications.

Table 1: Business Evolution Tools on the Service, Control, and Forwarding Planes

APPLICATION/SERVICE PLANE
Path Computation Content Insertion Content Optimization

CONTROL AND POLICY PLANE

IP/MPLS Customer Profiles Policy Enforcement

FORWARDING PLANE
Routing and Active Services
Dynamic Filters Sampling Engines
Switching Engines

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Conclusion
Juniper Networks has pioneered a three-layer model of the Next-Generation Network (NGN) architecture, where
network scalability and intelligence are based upon independent and orthogonal planes: Forwarding (packet
transport), Control (user and service policies), and Services (complex packet manipulation). The products and
solutions that are mapped to these planes support many applications, as illustrated in the following figure.

Control: JCS1200
t MPLS core

t HD video multicast at scale

tt Network consolidation
(collapsed POP architectures)

tt Service separation (equal access)

tt Accelerated service rollout
Forwarding: T1600 t High capacity route reflectors
ttt Service-aware SLA monitoring
ttt Real-time ad insertion
DP

ttt Access control

PS
e:

ttt Path computation

ic
rv
Se

Figure 8: Applications made possible by Juniper Networks products on the three planes

Many more applications are enabled by this sophisticated toolset. These include dynamic path computation, video
monitoring, real-time engineering of service tunnels, automated service-level agreement (SLA) monitoring, and
content insertion/optimization, as well as proprietary control plane applications such as load-based and audience-
based routing protocols or content-driven routing schemes at terabit speeds. In many cases, the requirements and
expertise of the individual service provider dictate the possibilities.
Juniper’s leadership in the NGN core enables service providers to meet their emerging business requirements
by creating intelligent networks that can scale independently across multiple dimensions. Juniper’s unique
architectural choices enable service providers to rapidly expand their offerings, and to reduce capital and operating
expenditures while creating more opportunities to increase top-line growth.
A network built around the T Series and the JCS1200 control plane lays a foundation to support virtual service
networks that decouple services from infrastructure, allowing each to grow at their appropriate rate. The PSDP adds
a third dimension of scaling in the service plane, and enables providers to create new applications that monetize the
network. This architectural vision, along with Juniper’s long history of delivering best-in-class infrastructure, is the
reason why there are over 4500 T Series Core Routers deployed in over 200 networks worldwide, and why T1600 is
being adopted at a rate that is four times that of the competition.

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References
Applications for an Independent Control Plane:
http://www.juniper.net/us/en/local/pdf/app-notes/3500134-en.pdf
Control Plane Scaling and Router Virtualization:
http://www.juniper.net/us/en/local/pdf/whitepapers/2000261-en.pdf
Efficient Scaling for Multiservice Networks:
http://www.juniper.net/us/en/local/pdf/whitepapers/2000207-en.pdf
Energy Efficiency for Network Equipment:
http://www.juniper.net/us/en/local/pdf/whitepapers/2000284-en.pdf
Multicast Architectures in Crossbar-Based Routers:
http://www.juniper.net/us/en/local/pdf/whitepapers/2000281-en.pdf
Network Operating System Evolution:
http://www.juniper.net/us/en/local/pdf/whitepapers/2000264-en.pdf

About Juniper Networks

Juniper Networks, Inc. is the leader in high-performance networking. Juniper offers a high-performance network
infrastructure that creates a responsive and trusted environment for accelerating the deployment of services and
applications over a single network. This fuels high-performance businesses. Additional information can be found at
www.juniper.net.

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