ETSI today announced the availability of its network functions virtualization (NFV) Release 2 specifications. This release builds on the ETSI Industry Specification Group on NFV (ETSI ISG NFV) documentation that was published in late 2014.

ETSI’s NFV specifications deliver requirements, interfaces, and information models that enable interoperability of software based on the ETSI NFV architectural framework.

Its NFV Release 2 incorporates 11 new group specifications in addition to the many NFV specifications already published. Release 2 outlines the necessary functional requirements in relation to such things as the management of virtualized resources, lifecycle management of both network services and virtualized network functions, network performance management, and virtualized resource capacity management.

“This represents another major step towards our objective of defining a comprehensive set of specifications that will facilitate the deployment of NFV throughout the telecommunication industry,” said Telefónica's Diego Lopez, the newly appointed Chairman of ETSI NFV ISG.

Telefónica has aligned with the Open Source MANO (OSM) community. OSM focuses on delivering a management and orchestration (MANO) stack aligned with the ETSI NFV architectural framework. OSM is doing similar work as the open source group Open-O, which was established at around the same time as OSM. Open-O is hosted by the Linux Foundation.