At the core of all networks today are optical networks which serve as the backbone of modern connectivity. Speaking in a keynote address at the OFC conference this week, Urs Hölzle, vice president of technical infrastructure at Google, detailed how Google has built its network and why it needs more improvement from optical vendors to help scale.
Hölzle explained that Google’s cloud network started with a basic co-location approach. It then evolved to the current stage which he referred to as Cloud 2.0, which is all about virtual machines and the services that run on top of them. What’s just starting to evolve now is Cloud 3.0, which is another layer of abstraction and the beginning of serverless services.