Introducing Automated Verification and Validation for Virtualized Network Functions and Services

NFV and SDN transform network management and operation into agile development tasks. They involve software artefacts, which are managed and deployed as composite services using DevOps principles. Those softwarized networks rely on complex technology stacks, starting with low-level virtualization technologies and ranging up to machine-learning-based orchestration solutions. One of the main challenges in those environments is to verify that the deployed functions and services operate correctly and meet the quality goals set by the stakeholders before they are put into production. We tackle this challenge by introducing the novel concept of a verification and validation (V&V) platform for NFV, which enables automatic testing and qualification of single network functions and complex services. By adding such a platform to the NFV ecosystem, new business models emerge, as we discuss in this article. We evaluate our proposed concepts by presenting a case study that uses our open source V&V platform to verify and validate the behavior and performance of a real-world network service.