Build a Network
That’s Opento Change
Design and develop large-scale
fabrics that meet the needs ofdemanding modern workloads
like Gen AI, on your terms.

Table ofContents

Challenges with an evolving networking landscape . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
The Dell Technologies point of view . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
The value of our open networking vision . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5Open up the network — and connect to new possibilities. . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Learn more . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

The world is advancing at a rapid clip. A global pandemic,
emerging technologies, and a continual influx of data have
put new demands on your IT infrastructure, and tremendous
strain on your network. We’ve hit a point where it’s no longer
enough to keep up with change. Rather, it’s about being
prepared for whatever comes next.
While great strides have been made in the server andstorage space in terms of, for example, virtualization,
convergence, and disaggregation, networks have beenslower to follow suit. Traditionally rigid and proprietary,
networks create a lot of extra work for IT admins who would
like to spend more time innovating and modernizing thenetwork than responding to issues or maintenancedemands.
At Dell Technologies, we’re dedicated to changing that.
On one hand, we’re bringing something unique anddifferentiated — an open networking option — that isgenerating industry buzz and recognition. On the other, we’reputting the Dell Technologies brand, our end-to-end offering,and global supply chain to work for your business andnetworking objectives.
Our evolved open networking vision brings massive
scalability along with added agility in open, disaggregatedsolutions. Pick and choose the hardware, software, andnetwork operating systems that best fit your requirements
within your data center and at the edge. At the same time,
take advantage of automation, innovative management tools
and other key integrations that streamline and simplify yourexperience with open networking technology.

3

Challenges with an evolving
networking landscape
When it comes to your network, do you feel like you areoperating in response mode? Are you dealing with changing
traffic patterns, settling for rigid and slow-moving proprietary
solutions, struggling to maintain capacity? Is your network
complex, and do you spend a lot of time simply maintaining
it? Do you worry it will not deliver scalability, exceptional
performance and reliability across AI fabrics? If you
answered “yes” to these questions, you’re not alone.
For years, network traffic patterns were somewhat
predictable, but that is changing. The global pandemic
brought work from home mandates and massive shifts in
network traffic. Instead of operating from a central location
within the network, your employees — now working
remotely — are accessing applications and files within yourdata center from outside locations. This puts an increased
load on your network.
At the same time, more network traffic is generated throughthe use of generative AI, machine learning andvirtualization — emerging solutions that haveexponentially increased the collection and flow of data.
Most networking vendors run systems with proprietaryfeatures and functionality. While this wasn’t really aproblem when you could patiently wait for the next system
upgrade, the new reality is that you must move faster thanproprietary systems with long development cycles will allow.
We recognize that you’re looking for easier, moreseamless ways of keeping up with demand. You want a
network and an AI fabric that is optimized for today, but that
also provides flexibility to adopt new features andfunctionality tomorrow without undergoing a forklift upgrade.
Finally, many network operating systems are super complex.
They’re still using command line interface (CLI) formanagement. And manual management using CLIs is labor
intensive and prone to error.
All these factors have created greater demand for larger
networks, networks that can scale faster and are more flexible
and amenable to change.

4Dell Technologies is keenly aware of the challenges thatexist in the networking space and what must be done toaddress the limitations brought on by slow-moving legacy,
proprietary networks.
We want to simplify multi-cloud connectivity and dramatically
improve your experience. Only with powerful, highly scalable
and agile data center and edge networking solutions can you
address these challenges and take your network
infrastructure to the next level.
An open networking, standards-based approach completely
disaggregates hardware and software as well as thenetworking operating system itself. This provides more
freedom to choose your desired networking components andprovides silicon diversity. You can build a network that iscustomized to meet your needs, and avoid vendor lock-in.

AI Workloads needrobust networks.

As capacity requirements shift, emerging technologies likegenerative AI bring new demands. Networking is a vital
component of AI infrastructure. When the unexpectedoccurs, we want you to confidently move forward with a
network that is flexible, simple to operate, and scalable.
With many AI workloads running on large clusters of servers
requiring constant communication between each other andstorage, AI workloads need robust networking to avoid
bottlenecks. If your networking is insufficient for the AI
workload, training and inference times will increase, slowing
data processing and time to insights.

The value of our open
networking vision
With Dell Technologies Open Networking, we offer acomplete strategy that combines networking scalability andagility with standards-based hardware and innovative, bestin-class software solutions — and the automation tools tostreamline a large amount of manual intervention.
You’ll be in a better position to meet workflow andapplication demands with greater network flexibly andcontrol.

Open to scale

Dell Technologies Open Networking is designed around ahighly scalable, cloud-ready data center network fabric. Itleverages real-world tested Software for Open Networking in
the Cloud (SONiC) OS, originally developed and hardenedby Microsoft® for hyperscale cloud environments.

Enterprise SONiC
Distribution by DellTechnologies is thefirst commercial
version to provide
enterprise-readyfeatures and global
support for largescale environments.

Enterprise SONiC Distribution by Dell Technologies helps IT
organizations to run their business with the innovation,automation and reliability that comes from the firstcommercial offering of SONiC with production-readyenterprise feature enhancements and global support
targeted for demanding cloud, data center and edge fabrics.
And we’ve hardened it with extensive testing and validation
across our Dell PowerSwitch portfolio.
5The SONiC OS is built around a containerized architecture thatuses standards-based APIs and enjoys a thriving developer
community and vendor ecosystem. You gain flexibility toadapt various applications to your environment — and run only
what you need. Dell's Enterprise SONiC has a dedicatedroadmap of features to support emerging modern workloads
like virtualization and generative AI. The solution is also
backed by a large community of developers who are
constantly delivering new software and applications.
Achieve better outcomes for data center networking solutions
by easily integrating the latest open source and virtualization
innovations.

Open to choose

Dell Technologies Open Networking enables greater agility tocustomize a just-right network that leverages modern, costeffective, open standards-based solutions. You can choose
from a broad offering of innovative network infrastructure
platforms, network operating systems, components of the OS,
and native network tools and applications. Our disaggregatedhardware, software and OS offering for the data center andnetwork edge is tested, certified and globally supported.

SONiC is currently
running on 40,000+
Azure® switches.

For example, you can take advantage of the highly scalable
Enterprise SONiC Distribution by Dell Technologies or otherfull-featured software-defined networking operating systems,
like SmartFabric OS10 software.
In the past, Dell Technologies worked closely with Microsoft on
the Switch Abstraction Interface (SAI), which is what allows us
to run different types of operating systems on our switching
hardware. You can now choose from a broad range of
Ethernet switches for core, edge or cloud deployments.
The Dell PowerSwitch portfolio is designed for architecturalagility and flexibility, helping you smoothly migrate to asoftware-designed data center. With Dell PowerSwitch
portfolio, you can deploy clusters with 1000s of nodes with low
latency and high throughput using high bandwidth switching
and improved congestion monitoring, flow control andtransport protocols available in Dell’s Enterprise SONiC
network operating system.
In addition to switches, we offer multi-function solutions that
operate at the network edge. Dell Virtual Edge Platforms(VEP) are edge platforms ideal for remote offices, districts, andmore. These edge solutions greatly reduce the cost of remoteconnections by leveraging existing broadband facilities. The
VEP platforms are also disaggregated, which means you caninterchange components such as virtual firewalls.

6

Automate up to99% of network
configuration
steps.

Open to simplify

At Dell Technologies, we simplify the design, deployment
and operations of the network infrastructure from edge tocore to cloud. We break down silos, help reduce mundane
and repetitive tasks, and give your IT admins freedom tospend more time on new services and innovation.
We greatly simplify management and integration with stateof-the-art data center networking automation software likeRed Hat® Ansible®, Dell SmartFabric, and CloudIQ. Forexample, the Dell SmartFabric OS10 with SmartFabricServices automates up to 99% of the network configuration
steps for VxRail hyperconverged environments.
And by eliminating a lot of the manual activities, you canalso minimize errors, which is great news given that 90% ofissues occur because of human error: someone
misconfiguring a port or protocol setting, for example.

Open up the network — andconnect to new possibilities
Network modernization is the ultimate objective. But weunderstand that you don’t want just any solution. You want
an enterprise- or telco-grade network that is proven to scaleand grow with your business — that’s customized for yourspecific needs, easier to integrate and manage, and fully
supported by the Dell Technologies brand.
Working together, let’s take your network to the next level.
Where you can integrate more easily with other systems
and have the capacity to address tomorrow's traffic patterns.
Where you can support the adoption of new technologies,
new workloads, and applications. Where you can automate
and simplify network management, removing the stigma of
network complexity moving forward. And, most importantly,
where you are open to new technologies, new shifts — and,of course, new possibilities.

Learn more.
Click here to learn more about
Dell Technologies Open Networking.

Copyright © 2024 Dell Inc. or its subsidiaries. All Rights Reserved. Dell, and other trademarks are trademarks of Dell Inc. or its subsidiaries. VMware®
products are covered by one or more patents listed at http://www.vmware.com/go/patents. VMware® is a registered trademark or trademark of VMware, Inc.
in the United States and/or other jurisdictions. Microsoft® and Azure® are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation in the U.S. andother countries. Red Hat® and Ansible® are trademarks of Red Hat, Inc. in the United States and other countries. Other trademarks may be the property of
their respective owners. Published in the USA 03/04 POV
Dell Technologies believes the information in this document is accurate as of its publication date. The information is subject to change without notice.