Open Networking Foundation Releases Stratum, Next-Gen SDN Platform

The Open Networking Foundation (ONF) released Stratum, which will provide an open source foundation for the operator consortium's next-generation software-defined networking (SDN) work. In pursuit of a truly "software defined" data plane based on white-box switches, the ONF in March first unveiled the Stratum project, backed by 23 founding members, including Google. After the subsequent incubation period, the official release of Stratum was announced last week. "Stratum is an open source, silicon-independent switch operating system for software-defined networks that runs on a variety of switching silicon and various whitebox switch platforms," the ONF said. Stratum avoids the vendor lock-in found with today's data planes that feature proprietary silicon interfaces and closed software APIs that tend to lock operators into using a specific hardware technology. Stratum makes possible easy integration of new devices into operators' networks, making Stratum the foundation for delivering a minimal production-ready distribution for white box switches."