Used for years by providers of public cloud services, the open-source platform for cloud computing OpenStack is becoming a go-to for telecommunication companies, including AT&T Inc., that are looking to build internal private clouds.

“There’s definitely a nice synergy between telcos and OpenStack,” said Lisa-Marie Namphy (pictured, left), OpenStack ambassador and community architect, explaining that the main attraction is in providing scalable, low-cost clouds.

Namphy and Ildiko Vancsa (pictured, right), ecosystem technical lead at the OpenStack Foundation, spoke to host Jeff Frick (@JeffFrick) and guest host Scott Raynovich (@rayno) of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile live streaming studio, during the Open Networking Summit in Santa Clara, California.

Namphy and Vancsa discussed how OpenStack is becoming more popular in the networking space, as well as how they collaborate with Linux.

OpenStack and the network connection

As one of the representatives of OpenStack at an open networking conference, Vancsa explained this is the perfect opportunity to learn about what’s new in the networking space and the challenges of tomorrow, as well as how OpenStack can begin to address those challenges today.

While enterprises have been using open source for a while, increased adoption of OpenStack is leading to better innovation and better product development, Vancsa stated. She said it’s not just AT&T that is using OpenStack. NTT DOCOMO Inc., a Japanese telecommunications firm, has engineers working on OpenStack code.

The engineers worked on the Open Platform for NFV collaboration, with Vancsa noting it was an interesting journey seeing how the engineers originally got to know OpenStack and then six months later they had become advocates and code contributors. There were not many Python developers in the beginning (OpenStack is written in Python), so they hired Linux developers and taught them Python, Namphy explained. That’s how a lot of OpenStack information came into companies.

Companies are now seeing the importance of OpenStack and are starting to dedicate full-time employees to the software, she added.

The Linux Foundation and OpenStack have always had a nice synergy, have worked closely together and have mutual members on both boards, Namphy stated.

“They’re one big, happy, open-source family,” she added.

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of Open Networking Summit. 

Photo: SiliconANGLE