Packet Transport Trends: IP/MPLS Success Challenged as Deployment Footprint Expands

For most of the last decade, the prevailing industry assumption was that large public networks would migrate all services, transport, and switching to a single end-to-end IP/MPLS network - convergence. This assumption was validated by significant growth in IP/MPLS investment. Looking to the future, economic forces that affect suppliers, as much as operators, are challenging this assumption, and other scenarios now seem plausible.