Nokia launched a new data center management platform that taps into the Kubernetes playbook to liberate enterprises from management and workforce complexity, and also further highlights the equipment giant’s diverse product set that is competing against segment giants like Cisco and Juniper Networks.

The vendor’s EventDriven Automation platform builds on the Kubernetes ecosystem to provide an abstraction layer to help enterprises manage data center networks from different providers. It also uses generative artificial intelligence (AI) to help with that management and reduce human-caused errors, which is a common source of data center configuration mistakes.

Mike Bushong, VP of data center at Nokia, explained in an interview that the intent-based nature of the platform allows it to translate a Nokia configuration as well as translate to “let's say, Cisco or Arista or Sonic or whatever. So it's an intent-based platform that is multivendor.”

The Kubernetes connection includes the use of Kubernetes APIs and toolchains to provide the platform’s intent-based, event-driven, and declarative approach for network automation.

“We’re literally using Kubernetes,” Bushong said. “Kubernetes will tell you that a resource is a resource is a resource, and we will tell you that a fabric is a fabric is a fabric.”

Nokia uses this microservices-based approach to data center management, which Bushong said allows the platform to “age better” than competing platforms from vendors like Juniper. “It is a more modern solution,” Bushong said, adding “We're leveraging modern architectures.”

Bushong also explained that this abstraction helps from a business perspective in that it can help deal with a changing workforce environment. This includes the ability to tap into a more diverse employee base.

“If you fail to plan for the workforce evolution, you will be stuck dependent on highly paid, very highly trained specialists to do things that are not necessarily particularly challenging but requires such intimate knowledge of the CLI that the only way you can do it is with these people,” Bushong said.

Nokia’s focus on Kubernetes follows a long tail by the vendor in tapping into that open source container management platform model. This includes its work behind the new Kubenet project that it’s backing to help automate networking.

AI moderation Bushong’s bullishness on the Kubernetes is tempered by a more realistic view on AI, making it clear that while EventDriven Automation uses AI, he did not want to overhype the AI component of the platform.

“What we want to do is provide unified operations over the top and then a natural language interface so that you can query all of it regardless of what's underneath, and then our tool will handle the translation,” Bushong explained. “And yes, AI is an ingredient to that, but I would say it's a supporting thing. The main player in this is, let me drive human error to zero and let me speed up remediation. Put ourselves in the context of the user, not necessarily in the context of the product or marketing team that's looking to get additional hype out of this thing.”

This approach is targeted at a more end-user view of how network management is currently being dealt with in the field.

“To be fair. I don't fully believe in self-healing networks, so I don't want to oversell,” Bushong said. “I think what it does is it gives you a solid starting point, and it takes away a lot of the arduous tasks of collecting information to try to find out what's going on, which lets you avoid the minutes or hours of collection and lets you start immediately on the higher value stuff.”

Bushong’s AI hesitancy comes as that term is becoming increasingly tied to the data center space.

Dell’Oro Group recently reported that AI drove surging demand for data center physical infrastructure (DCPI) during the second quarter of this year, which was the first increase in that market since early 2023.

“Sales of DCPI with the characteristics to support accelerated computing deployments have been present in the market for the past year, but that growth has been outweighed by the unwinding of orders from 2022 and early 2023,” Dell’Oro Group Research Director Lucas Beran wrote. “Now, cloud and colocation service providers are rushing to add data center capacity to historically low vacancy rates, with new designs to support higher rack power densities and manage AI workload variability.”

Can this be a bright spot for Nokia? Nokia linked the new platform to its long-standing Service Router (SR) Linux network operating system (OS) and its data center switching and routing platforms. It also follows the vendor’s recent push deeper into the networking space through a pending $2.3 billion acquisition of optical networking firm Infinera.

Nokia CEO Pekka Lundmark recently stated that the vendor could be looking at “bolt-on acquisitions” for the vendor’s optical network operations post-Infinera, but added that any move would have to be fiscally responsible.

“When it comes to additional deals, we continue to be extremely prudent,” Lundmark said. “There could be bolt-on acquisitions, but any acquisitions would have to follow extremely strong and compelling industrial logic. Strong synergies, strong logic. That will always be a prerequisite for any acquisition.”

This push has allowed Nokia to differentiate itself from direct telecom equipment rival Ericsson, which has stated it has no desire to chase Nokia into the data center networking space.

Nokia’s broadening ambitions are coming at a time of increasing questions around the vendor’s future. There have been reports that Nokia is looking to shed its telecom-focused equipment business and others about the company’s board looking to replace Lundmark.

Bushong, for his part, noted that he remains focused on driving more recognition of Nokia’s data center and networking efforts.

“The challenge is that we're sitting on a stockpile of goodness and, frankly, getting that out so that people understand what we stand for and how we've done it, that's a go-to-market challenge,” Bushong said, noting that has been complicated by Nokia’s engineering-focused history and rash of name changes tied to recent mergers and acquisitions. “What we've got to do is overcome some of that and then have an earnest conversation with people who are actually grappling with what to do next. When we have that conversation, I think people will be open. They want something different and, frankly, the incumbents are not delivering.”