Q. What business challenge does Cisco Prime™ Network Services Controller address?
A. Cloud environments are highly dynamic, elastic, and nearly real time. They consist of thousands of virtual service instances that require frequent changes and continuing evolution. The Cisco Prime Network Services Controller is an exceptional management-control-plane solution that provides centralized management of virtual network services. It has been designed to address virtualization challenges at its core and has rapidly become a key component of Cisco's cloud-management strategy.
Designed for enterprise and multitenant cloud deployments, Cisco Prime Services Network Controller offers transparent and scalable management based on automation. It can be integrated with Cisco® Nexus 1000V InterCloud for virtualized data centers across private and public cloud environments. In addition, the Cisco Prime Services Network Controller supports advanced capabilities, including virtual machine mobility and migration in hybrid-cloud scenarios.
Q. Is Cisco Prime Network Services Controller a new solution?
A. Cisco Prime Network Services Controller is not a new solution. Formerly known as Cisco Virtual Network Management Center (VNMC), the product now has a new name and an updated user interface and has become part of the Cisco Prime product portfolio.
Q. Why is the name being changed?
A. Many Cisco software products are moving to the Cisco Prime portfolio in a phased approach. This step is more than just a name change. The engineering requirements for moving to Cisco Prime include consistent technology and usability across products with a common user interface.
As part of that transition, Cisco Prime Network Services Controller has a new name and user interface, and it offers a unified control point for network services.
Q. When was the name change formally announced?
A. Cisco Prime Network Services Controller was announced in June 2013.
Q. How is Cisco Prime Network Services Controller related to Cisco ONE, onePK, and ONE Controller?
A. The Cisco Prime Network Services Controller is not a software-defined networking (SDN) controller. It does contribute to the deployment of an overlay network, facilitate network services insertion, and allow private-to-public-cloud virtual machine mobility. As a result, it is an integral element of the Cisco Open Network Environment (ONE) strategy for network services, complementing the Cisco ONE controller (which addresses different use cases, such as forwarding and network slicing) and Cisco ONE Platform Kit (onePK) APIs.
We will provide more details in the future regarding the role of Cisco Prime Network Services Controller in the Cisco ONE strategy. In general, Cisco offers multiple controllers to address different use cases at different layers in the stack. Cisco Prime management software makes significant use of the Cisco onePK APIs and Cisco ONE Controller to deliver unified management.
Q. What are the technical changes in the new Cisco Prime Network Services Controller?
A. Cisco Prime Network Services Controller has been updated with a new user interface for better integration with the Cisco Prime portfolio. It also offers extended hypervisor support. We will provide more information in the weeks ahead to keep you updated on new capabilities as they become available.
Q. When will Cisco Prime Network Services Controller be available?
A. The Cisco Prime Network Services Controller will begin to ship later this summer.
Q. How is Cisco Prime Network Services Controller sold?
A. Cisco Prime Network Services Controller is available in a bundle with Cisco Nexus 1000V, Cisco Virtual Security Gateway (VSG), and Cisco ASA 1000V products.
Q. What licenses does a customer need to use Cisco Prime Network Services Controller?
A. A customer who purchases Cisco ASA 1000V, Cisco VSG, or Cisco Nexus 1000V products will receive a free software license for the Cisco Prime Network Services Controller standard edition.
Q. How will product implementations, support, and maintenance be performed for Cisco Prime Network Services Controller?
A. Product implementation services will not change. If you purchase Cisco ASA 1000V, Cisco VSG, or Cisco Nexus 1000V products, you will also receive maintenance for Cisco Prime Network Services Controller.
Q. How can customers get patches and service packs?
A. The Cisco Prime Network Services Controller software download page will be available for the external release in Q1 FY14.
All Cisco VNMC software downloads, patches, and service packs will continue to be available at http://software.cisco.com/download/release.html?mdfid=283444844&softwareid=283733173&release=2.0.3f&relind=AVAILABLE&rellifecycle=&reltype=latest&i=rm.
Q. Where can I learn more about Cisco Prime Network Services Controller?
A. Please visit http://www.cisco.com/go/services-controller.