Microservices Architecture

As more applications are being deployed in the cloud, the limitations of older, monolithic software applications are becoming more apparent. Changes made to a small part of the application require the entire monolith to be rebuilt and re-deployed. Scaling equates to scaling of the entire application rather than just the components that require more resources. As a result, changes and improvements are made at a glacial pace, new features are adopted slowly, and integration with third-party integration systems is difficult. In addition, the increasing CAPEX and OPEX required to operate and upgrade these platforms is becoming a material burden on the balance sheet.

The microservices architecture was developed to address these challenges. In a microservices architecture, an application is built using a combination of loosely coupled and service-specific software containers that communicate using APIs, instead of using a single, tightly coupled monolith of code.  This development methodology makes an application easier to enhance, maintain, and scale, making it prevalent in cloud environments.

Stratoss is built upon a container-based microservices architecture. Unlike the SDN and NFV solutions from large incumbent suppliers that package multiple monolithic software applications focused on individual technology domains, Stratoss provides a vendor-agnostic and programmable software platform that is highly customizable for the network operator. Beyond SDN management and control Stratoss can be tailored to support use cases ranging from NFV service orchestration to multi-vendor automation, and/or multi-domain service orchestration.