Neotec Working Group X. Li
Internet-Draft C. Li
Intended status: Standards Track China Telecom
Expires: 13 November 2025 12 May 2025
Unified Network and Cloud Orchestration Framework
draft-li-unco-framework-01
Abstract
This draft introduces the Unified Network and Cloud Orchestration
Framework (UNCO), which is designed to enable real-time and joint
orchestration of network and computing resources in 5G and future-
generation networks. UNCO framework addresses inefficiencies in
current resource scheduling mechanisms, resolves objective conflicts
across domains, and provides unified policy and security management.
It is applicable in emerging scenarios such as ultra-reliable low-
latency communications (URLLC), mobile edge computing (MEC), and
network slicing, where service quality and operational efficiency are
paramount.
Status of This Memo
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This Internet-Draft will expire on 13 November 2025.
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Table of Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
2. Conventions used in this document . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
3. Terminology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
4. Problem Overview . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
5. Overview of the UNCO framework . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
5.1. NSOS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
5.2. Cloud Manager . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
5.3. Network Controller . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
6. Standard Interfaces and Functional Requirements . . . . . . . 11
6.1. Standard Interfaces . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
6.2. Functional Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
7. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14
8. IANA Considerations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
9. Acknowledgement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
10. Normative References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
Authors' Addresses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
1. Introduction
As next-generation telecom networks evolve to support latency-
sensitive, compute-intensive, and highly dynamic applications across
metro networks, backbone networks, mobile networks, and beyond,
traditional siloed orchestration mechanisms are no longer sufficient.
The integration of network and computing resources is essential to
enable real-time, adaptive service provisioning across diverse
deployment environments. Current industry efforts such as ETSI NFV
[NFV033], 3GPP MEC, and IETF service chaining [RFC8969] have made
progress in specific domains, but a holistic orchestration framework
that bridges network and computing domains with unified security and
policy governance remains lacking.
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In addition, Telecom Clouds introduce new operational complexities
that differ significantly from public cloud deployments. Unlike
public clouds, which rely on third-party network providers, Telecom
Clouds operate under a single administrative domain where both
network and cloud infrastructure are tightly coupled and managed by
the same operator. This integration opens up opportunities for real-
time coordination between cloud service scaling events and network
policy adjustments. However, most existing network management
systems can not ajust with dynamic cloud states, which can lead to
inefficient load balancing, suboptimal routing, and SLA violations
for critical services like AI/ML pipelines, video streaming, and 5G
slice traffic.
To address these limitations, the UNCO framework introduces a
telemetry-driven mechanism whereby cloud-side resource and service
status can be abstracted and delivered to network controllers in near
real-time. This mechanism enables the dynamic adjustment of network
policies such as UCMP and load balancing, based on ongoing changes in
cloud resource availability or service deployment state. Unlike
existing IETF efforts (e.g., TEAS
[draft-ietf-teas-ietf-network-slice-framework], OPSAWG
[draft-ietf-opsawg-service-assurance-architecture], CATS
[draft-ietf-cats-framework]), which offer valuable foundations for
traffic engineering and service-aware routing, UNCO builds upon and
extends them by incorporating real-time cloud-derived metrics
directly into the orchestration logic. This approach ensures SLA-
compliant, fine-grained orchestration of both network and compute
infrastructure in multi-cloud and Telecom Cloud environments.
The Unified Network and Cloud Orchestration framework (UNCO)
addresses these gaps by enabling:
* Unified orchestration of computing and network resources.
* Dynamic, SLA-driven scheduling of heterogeneous resources.
* Cross-domain policy alignment and enforcement.
* Real-time observability and security management across domains.
UNCO introduces a layered architectural model with well-defined
functional modules and interfaces to facilitate standardization and
interoperability among diverse vendor ecosystems.
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2. Conventions used in this document
The key words "MUST", "MUST NOT", "REQUIRED", "SHALL", "SHALL NOT",
"SHOULD", "SHOULD NOT", "RECOMMENDED", "MAY", and "OPTIONAL" in this
document are to be interpreted as described in [RFC2119] [RFC8174].
3. Terminology
The following terms are used in this draft:
* UNCO: Unified Network and Cloud Orchestration Framework.
* NS-OSS: Network Service Orchestration and Scheduling System.
* MEC: Multi-access Edge Computing, a framework that extends cloud
capabilities to the edge of the network.
* URLLC: Ultra-Reliable Low-Latency Communications, a category of 5G
use cases requiring high reliability and very low latency.
* SLA: Service-Level Agreement, a formalized agreement on expected
service performance metrics.
* UCMP: Unequal-Cost Multi-Path routing, a technique that uses paths
with different costs simultaneously.
* TEAS: Traffic Engineering Architecture and Signaling, an IETF
working group focused on traffic engineering mechanisms.
* CATS: Computing-Aware Traffic Steering, an emerging framework for
steering traffic based on computing availability.
* NFV: Network Functions Virtualization, an architecture for
virtualizing network functions previously implemented in hardware.
[NFV033]
* YANG: Yet Another Next Generation, a data modeling language used
to model configuration and state data manipulated by the NETCONF
protocol.[RFC8969]
* RBAC: Role-Based Access Control, a policy-neutral access control
mechanism defined around roles and privileges.
* IAM: Identity and Access Management, the security discipline that
enables the right individuals to access the right resources at the
right times.
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* SDN: Software Defined Networking, an approach to networking that
uses software-based controllers to direct traffic on the network.
* API: Application Programming Interface, a set of definitions and
protocols for building and integrating application software.
* QoS: Quality of Service, the description or measurement of the
overall performance of a service.
* AR/VR/XR: Augmented Reality / Virtual Reality / Extended Reality,
technologies for immersive digital experiences.
4. Problem Overview
4.1 Real-Time and Dynamic Resource Scheduling
Modern applications, such as immersive reality, smart manufacturing,
and vehicular communication systems, demand rapid provisioning and
adjustment of both compute and network resources. Traditional
orchestrators often pre-allocate resources statically or based on
historical models, which are ill-suited to handle:
* Burst surges of user demands (e.g., traffic spikes in live
streaming).
* Elastic scaling requirements (e.g., AI inference workload
offloading).
* Edge-cloud resource handoff and failover scenarios.
These limitations lead to under-utilization of expensive
infrastructure and inconsistent quality of experience (QoE).
4.2 Contradictions Among Different Objectives
Multiple stakeholders often have conflicting optimization goals. For
instance:
* Maximizing compute utilization may increase network path
redundancy.
* Reducing latency by routing over low-latency paths may overload
specific compute clusters.
* Minimizing operational costs may sacrifice redundancy and
resilience.
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A successful orchestration strategy must balance these trade-offs
dynamically, based on service priorities and system state.
4.3 Lack of Joint Effectiveness Evaluation
Scheduling strategies are often evaluated independently in the
context of either network performance (e.g., throughput, delay) or
computing performance (e.g., CPU usage, task completion time).
However, next-gen services require holistic metrics that combine:
* End-to-end latency from user device to compute execution node.
* Task success rate under constrained bandwidth and CPU cycles.
* Adaptive resource reallocation under failure or congestion.
Such unified metrics are crucial for validating orchestration
policies.
4.4 Security and Strategy Fragmentation
Network policy (e.g., firewalls, ACLs, segmentation) and cloud
security policy (e.g., IAM, security groups) are traditionally
managed in isolation. This results in:
* Inconsistent access controls between compute and data planes.
* Increased cross-domain attack surface.
* Complexity in policy auditing, validation, and enforcement.
UNCO proposes a unified security model to enforce coherent policies
across cloud and network domains.
5. Overview of the UNCO framework
This section provides an overview of the UNCO framework and an
introduction to its key components. The high-level framework
overview of UNCO is shown in Figure 1.
UNCO is composed of three primary modules:
1. NSOS (Network Service Orchestration and Scheduling System): The
central decision-making and coordination entity responsible for
managing service deployment, orchestrating cross-domain
resources, and enforcing global policies.
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2. Cloud Manager: A cloud-native resource controller that abstracts
heterogeneous computing resources (VMs, containers, GPUs, NPUs,
etc.) across edge and central cloud domains. It acts as the
compute-plane orchestrator, reporting availability and enforcing
workload deployment.
3. Network Controller: A domain-specific SDN or legacy-compatible
controller that governs routing, QoS, and telemetry. It operates
on the data plane and acts as a programmable policy agent for
traffic forwarding, service chaining, and SLA-aware path
selection.
These components are deployed in a logically centralized but
physically distributed manner to support scalability and fault
tolerance. They interact via well-defined interfaces and protocols
to deliver seamless joint orchestration.
UNCO is designed to operate across hybrid infrastructures:
* Public Cloud: Multi-cloud environments (e.g., AWS, Azure, Alibaba
Cloud) .
* Private Cloud/Enterprise DC: Bare-metal and virtualized compute
clusters .
* Edge Computing: Regional micro-DCs or device-near nodes .
* Transport and Access Networks: L2/L3 infrastructure supporting
MPLS, SRv6, or P4-based forwarding.
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+----------------+
| Application |
+----------------+
| |
IN1.1 IN1.2
| |
+----------------+ --IN2.1-- +----------------+
| NSOS | --IN2.2-- | Cloud Manager |
+----------------+ +----------------+
| | |
IN3.1 IN3.2 |
| | |
+-------------------+ |
|Network Controller | |
+-------------------+ |
| |
+----------------|-----------------------------|---------------+
| +-----------|------------+ +--------|------------+ |
| | Public Cloud |-------| Cloud(VM/containers,| |
| | (WAN) | | GPUs/NPUs,etc.) | |
| +------------------------+ +---------------------+ |
+--------------------------------------------------------------+
Figure 1 The overall framework of UNCO
Each module can scale independently, supporting multi-tenancy, high
availability, and flexible deployment topologies. NSOS typically
includes a policy engine, resource graph model, service catalog, and
intent resolution logic. It may integrate with external OSS/BSS
systems for commercial service integration.
5.1. NSOS
The NSOS (Network Service Orchestration and Scheduling System) serves
as the brain of the UNCO framework. It is designed to perform
centralized decision-making while maintaining awareness of service
requirements, real-time resource availability, and policy enforcement
across domains. NSOS is capable of translating high-level
application intents into concrete actions such as workload placement,
bandwidth allocation, and route optimization.
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It plays a vital role in translating service-level requirements into
programmable tasks, ensuring optimal resource usage while maintaining
SLA commitments. The NSOS also maintains a overall view of global
topology and performance state of both computing and networking
infrastructure, enabling end-to-end orchestration decisions.
Moreover, it ensures feedback-driven loop closure, adapting
orchestration actions based on monitored outcomes. Through
coordination with both the Cloud Manager and the Network Controller,
the NSOS can adjust deployments in response to failures, demand
surges, or SLA violations.
The NSOS is a logically centralized orchestrator with the following
extended capabilities:
* Service Parsing & Decomposition: Translates high-level service
intents into fine-grained resource requirements.
* Topology Awareness: Maintains a live map of compute, storage, and
network nodes with performance telemetry.
* Feedback Loops & SLA Assurance: Continuously collects performance
metrics to adapt placements and routing in real-time.
* Security Federation: Validates policy consistency across cloud-
native RBAC and network access lists.
5.2. Cloud Manager
The Cloud Manager is the dedicated module responsible for managing
the full lifecycle of cloud-side computing resources, including
virtual machines, containers, GPUs, FPGAs, and NPUs, deployed across
centralized, regional, and edge datacenters. It plays a passive but
essential role in the UNCO architecture by exposing resource states
and executing scheduling directives issued by the NSOS.
It provides the following capabilities:
* Resource Management: Monitors and manages compute, storage, and
accelerator resources (e.g., CPU, GPU, FPGA).
* Telemetry Exposure to Network Provides fine-grained metrics such
as CPU/GPU usage, memory availability, disk IOPS, and thermal/load
levels. Metrics can be sampled per second, per event, or on
demand, and are tagged with contextual identifiers (e.g., service
instance ID, tenant ID, SLA level).
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* Execution of NS-OSS Scheduling Instructions Accepts compute
deployment instructions from NSOS, including resource types (e.g.,
CPU, GPU, FPGA), workload type (training, infehy rence, storage,
HPC), number of instances, placement constraints (region/zone/
affinity), image and network configuration, and reservation mode.
The Cloud Manager operates at the same architectural level as the
Network Controller, but with a compute-focused scope. It does not
make orchestration decisions but serves as an intelligent agent for
resource reporting and enforcement. All interactions with the
network plane occur indirectly via the NSOS, ensuring separation of
concerns and a clean interface model.
5.3. Network Controller
The Network Controller in UNCO serves as a programmable interface
between orchestration logic and the physical or virtual network
infrastructure. It is responsible for interpreting policies and
traffic engineering directives from NSOS and translating them into
actionable configurations on network devices or SDN agents.
As the network-facing component, the controller collects real-time
metrics from the underlying transport and access networks, including
traffic utilization, link health, congestion indicators, and routing
anomalies. These insights feed back into NSOS to enable adaptive
reconfiguration in response to network dynamics. The controller also
supports integration with emerging technologies such as P4
programmable data planes and segment routing protocols, allowing
fine-grained per-flow steering based on SLA metadata or service tags.
The Network Controller performs programmable data-plane management
and service-aware traffic engineering:
* Telemetry-Driven Path Optimization: Continuously monitors link
quality (bandwidth, jitter, RTT, congestion).
* Dynamic QoS Enforcement: Applies differentiated service policies
(e.g., priority queues, rate limits, ECN) based on slice and
service IDs.
* Programmable Fabric Support: Interfaces with SDN controllers, P4
switches, or segment routing agents for granular traffic steering.
* Inter-Domain Routing Federation: Coordinates with external network
controllers (e.g., IP/MPLS, BGP peers) for path stitching across
domains.
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The Network Controller, like the Cloud Manager, is coordinated by the
NSOS. While the Cloud Manager provides visibility into compute
supply, the Network Controller ensures that the transport
infrastructure aligns with compute demand. Together, they enable
closed-loop orchestration in real-time, multi-domain environments.
6. Standard Interfaces and Functional Requirements
6.1. Standard Interfaces
The UNCO framework defines standard interfaces between its components
to support unified orchestration and closed-loop control across cloud
and network domains. The interfaces are categorized as follows:
1) IN1: Application - NSOS Interface
This interface enables applications to interact with the
orchestration system for service deployment and resource feedback.
* IN1.1 Service Deployment Request (Application → NSOS)
- Parameters:
o Cloud Computing Resource：CPUã€RAM, etc.
o Storage：Type，size, etc.
o Network：Sourceã€destination location and SLA requirements.
- Purpose: Applications is able to specify desired service
deployment characteristics and constraints.
* IN1.2 Resource Allocation Result (NSOS → Application)
- Parameters:
o Cloud/computing resource node information.
o Storage location information.
o Network slicing information.
- Purpose: Informs applications of the allocated computing and
network resources.
2) Cloud Manager - NSOS Interface
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This interface enables the Cloud Manager to provide real-time cloud
resource status to NSOS.
* IN2.1 Resource Metrics Report (Cloud Manager → NSOS)
- Parameters:
o Resource Identification: VM ID/Container Group/Storage
Volume ID.
o Indicator type: CPU utilization/memory usage/disk IOPS/GPU
load.
o Sampling period: seconds/minutes/event triggered.
o Related service tags: Service/Tenant/SLA level.
- Purpose: Enables NSOS to assess cloud-side resource
availability and support informed scheduling decisions.
* IN2.2 Service Status Report (Cloud Manager → NSOS)
- Parameters:
o Computing power requirements: computing power types
(CPU/GPU/FPGA), Resource quantity (number of CPU
cores/memory/GPU model and quantity), Scenarios
(training/inference/storage/high-performance computing) .
o Network status: topology, bandwidth, latency and other
information • Deployment configuration: availability data
center, image identification (operating system/preset image
ID), network configuration (VPC ID/subnet ID/security group
rule summary).
o Resource pre-occupation: resource pool type (public cloud/
private cloud/hybrid cloud), pre-occupation mode (on-demand/
reserved instance), storage configuration (type/capacity/
IOPS).
- Purpose: Supports service lifecycle management, monitoring, and
fault recovery.
3) IN3: NSOS - Network Controller Interface
This interface allows the NSOS to dynamically program the network
according to real-time cloud and service state and requirements.
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* IN3.1 Issuing of Network Control Policy (NSOS → Network
Controller)
- Parameters:
o Link identifier: source/destination node ID, logical link
name.
o Cloud Serivce instance ID, a globally unique identifier
assigned to each cloud-based service instance (such as a
virtual machine, container, or function) deployed within the
Telecom Cloud. This ID is used for tracking, management,
and associating network policies to specific service
instances.
o Target bandwidth required (Mbps/Gbps）.
o Effective method: immediate effect/smooth transition (rate
gradient time window).
- Purpose: Issuing of Network Control Policy.
* IN3.2 Report of Network Status (Network Controller→ NSOS)
- Parameters:
o Link ID: Logical link globally unique identifier.
o Real-time bandwidth utilization: current traffic percentage
(%) .
o Delay and packet loss: Avg/Max delay (ms) and packet loss
rate (%) in the most recent sampling period.
o Timestamp: Data collection time.
- Purpose: Provides telemetry for closed-loop network control and
orchestration optimization.
6.2. Functional Requirements
To ensure UNCO support a wide range of networked applications across
edge, cloud, and transport environments, it defines a set of
functional requirements that guide its architectural design and
interface behaviors. These requirements emphasize responsiveness,
reliability, and compatibility across multi-vendor, multi-domain
infrastructures. The following functions are essential to enable
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joint orchestration of computing and networking resources while
preserving service quality, optimizing resource utilization, and
maintaining policy consistency.
Here are some functional requirements:
* FR1: SLA-compliant orchestration for computing, network, and
storage resources.
* FR2: Elastic demand-driven scheduling based on real-time data and
service intent.
* FR3: Inter-domain policy normalization and conflict mitigation
across compute and network planes.
* FR4: Observability and feedback mechanisms for orchestration
decisions.
* FR5: Unified access control, audit trails, and policy enforcement
across domain.
7. Conclusion
Cloud computing has become a foundational component in the
infrastructure of modern telecom operators. With the increasing
deployment of cloud-based AI services and edge-native applications,
it is essential to support integrated orchestration of cloud and
network resources as well as end-to-end security management. UNCO
addresses these requirements by providing mechanisms to incorporate
cloud-related information into network control and policy decision-
making, enabling dynamic, SLA-driven service management.
However, the lack of standardized interfaces and models for
exchanging cloud telemetry across the network domain remains a key
obstacle. Cross-domain collaboration is often hindered by
proprietary APIs, inconsistent abstractions, and limited
interoperability. These limitations result in delayed network
adjustments and fragmented service delivery.
UNCO addresses these challenges by proposing a unified framework and
standardized interfaces that bring real-time cloud awareness into
network orchestration. Its ability to coordinate compute and network
resources holistically enables more resilient, efficient, and SLA-
compliant service delivery across public clouds, private datacenters,
and edge platforms.
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As UNCO continues to evolve, its ability to bridge these gaps through
telemetry integration, policy abstraction, and multi-domain
orchestration will be critical. Potential application scenarios
include:
* Elastic AI/ML service hosting at the edge and core, requiring
workload-aware bandwidth and path adjustments.
* Immersive applications (AR/VR/XR, cloud gaming, real-time
collaboration) that rely on strict latency and jitter guarantees.
* Dynamic multi-cloud interconnection for enterprise-grade network
slicing and hybrid connectivity, etc.
These emerging services demand orchestration frameworks like UNCO
that go beyond siloed resource management and offer unified,
programmable, and standards-aligned operational control.
UNCO presents a comprehensive framework for integrating computing and
networking orchestration in modern networks. By addressing dynamic
scheduling, multi-objective trade-offs, cross-domain policy
harmonization, and end-to-end security, UNCO provides a strong
foundation for enabling future-ready services.
8. IANA Considerations
TBD
9. Acknowledgement
TBD
10. Normative References
[draft-ietf-cats-framework]
"Computing-Aware Traffic Steering Framework".
[draft-ietf-opsawg-service-assurance-architecture]
"draft-ietf-opsawg-service-assurance-architecture –
Service Assurance Architecture".
[draft-ietf-teas-ietf-network-slice-framework]
"draft-ietf-teas-ietf-network-slice-framework – IETF
Network Slice Framework", September 2019.
[NFV033] "ETSI GS NFV-IFA 033-2020", September 2010.
[RFC2119] "RFC2119".
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[RFC8174] "Ambiguity of Uppercase vs Lowercase in RFC 2119 Key
Words".
[RFC8969] "A Framework for Automating Service and Network Management
with YANG".
Authors' Addresses
Xueting Li
China Telecom
Beiqijia Town, Changping District
Beijing
Beijing, 102209
China
Email: lixt2@foxmail.com
Cong Li
China Telecom
Beiqijia Town, Changping District
Beijing
Beijing, 102209
China
Email: licong@chinatelecom.cn
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