Heterogeneous service provider model through pay-for-performance based transit settlements

• US 8,719,447 B2
• Filed: 05/04/2010
• Issued: 05/06/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 05/04/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Aryaka Networks
• Original Assignee: Aryaka Networks
• Inventors: Gupta, Ajit, Nagaraj, Ashwath, Bharadhwaj, Rajeev
• Primary Examiner(s): Gart, Matthew S
• Assistant Examiner(s): MAICHER, MICHAEL D
• Application Number:
  US12/773,031
• Publication Number:
  US 20110276446A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,463 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 709/240
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 10/06 Resources, workflows, human or project management; Enterprise or organisation planning; Enterprise or organisation modelling
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/00 Commerce
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/018 Certifying business or products
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 30/04 Billing or invoicing

Abstract

A method and system of a heterogeneous service provider model through pay-for-performance based transit settlements are disclosed. In one embodiment, a system includes a plurality of Point of Presence (POP) locations between a head office and a branch office in a heterogeneous computer network configured to communicate data through a pay-per-performance peering relationship between different entities of the heterogeneous computer network. In this embodiment, the system implements a debit-credit mechanism configured to handle payments as well as penalties associated with violation of a pair-wise mutual agreement between independent for-profit entities providing network services in a segment of the heterogeneous computer network.

Claims

1. A system comprising:

a head office;

a branch office associated with the head office;

a heterogeneous Wide Area Network (WAN) comprising a number of independent for-profit entities providing network services; and

a plurality of Point of Presence (POP) locations between the head office and the branch office in the heterogeneous WAN configured to communicate data through a pay-per-performance peering relationship between the number of independent for-profit entities of the heterogeneous WAN, the communication of the data being sped up through intelligent design of the plurality of POP locations such that each POP location has a capability to analyze a destination of a packet of the data and to communicate the packet between the plurality of POP locations with an unaltered Internet Protocol (IP) address through at least one of a Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE), an Internet Protocol Security (IPsec), a Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS), and a Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN), at least one of the head office and the branch office being configured to generate secured transport data to be transmitted over at least one secure tunnel between at least one intervening firewall such that the data is routed securely through the plurality of POP locations toward a destination, the plurality of POP locations being implemented with a multi-segment architecture and enabling a multi-tenancy in each POP location, and each POP location implemented to provide a WAN optimization and an application acceleration during the communication of the data,

wherein the WAN optimization and the application acceleration enable a distribution of a number of tasks across the WAN,

wherein the system implements a debit-credit mechanism configured to handle payments as well as penalties associated with violation of a pair-wise mutual agreement between the number of independent for-profit entities providing network services in a segment of the heterogeneous WAN, and

wherein the debit-credit mechanism is based on at least one of a bandwidth savings and a reduced latency in the segment of the heterogeneous WAN.

2. The system of claim 1,

wherein the number of independent for-profit entities include an application acceleration service provider,

wherein the segment is a portion of a communication link between the number of independent for-profit entities of the heterogeneous WAN, and

wherein at least one of an accelerating operation and a routing operation of data between the segments is governed by a policy consistent with the pair-wise mutual agreement.

3. The system of claim 2,

wherein the plurality of POP locations is configured to perform an application acceleration function ‘

A’

for a plurality of business entities through a placement of at least one of a collaborative document, a computed document, and a static document of an enterprise application at a closest POP location to a requesting entity,

wherein the acceleration function ‘

A’

applies a bandwidth constraint and a latency constraint as factors of an acceleration service, thereby resulting in the bandwidth savings and the reduced latency between the number of independent for-profit entities of the heterogeneous WAN, and

wherein the plurality of POP locations is shared by a plurality of licensed entities of an application acceleration service, each of the plurality of licensed entities having at least one head office and at least one branch office, and each of the plurality of licensed entities leveraging both a shared software and a shared hardware infrastructure of the application acceleration service provider.

4. The system of claim 3, further comprising an external network service as a licensed entity of the application acceleration service, wherein the external network service is contracted to at least one for-profit entity included in the pair-wise mutual agreement, and wherein the external network service comprises a network service external to the head office, the branch office, and the application acceleration service.

5. The system of claim 1,

wherein data associated with the application acceleration is re-routed during an intermediate POP failure through an alternate route associated with another POP location in the computer network,

wherein a service provider owns at least one of a link and an equipment to perform the application acceleration service, and

wherein the application acceleration is performed as a service without any Customer Premise Equipment (CPE) in the head office and the branch office.

6. The system of claim 3, further comprising:

at least one of a CPE device, a branch router, and a head-office router, coupled with at least one of the head office and the branch office;

to perform an Advanced Redundancy Removal (ARR) function to avoid sending previously sent patterns in at least one of a transport stream and a packet stream,

to perform Transmission Control Protocol (TCP) proxies, with varying policies for at least one of TCP windows, buffering and security,

to optionally perform protocol dependent split proxies on at least one of the transport stream and the packet stream,

to generate a secure transport data sent over secure tunnels of at least one of the collaborative document, the computed document, and the static document, and

to communicate the secured transport data between a client device in the branch office and the head office through at least one of an Internet Protocol Security (IPsec) tunnel, a Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE) tunnel, VLAN, and MPLS labels using IP headers.

7. The system of claim 1,

wherein a bandwidth and latency is measured across a sub-network in a segment of the heterogeneous WAN from a third-party provider included in the pair-wise mutual agreement, and

wherein a requisite network software and a requisite network hardware from another third-party provider included in one of the pair-wise mutual agreement and another pair-wise mutual agreement associated with the heterogeneous WAN is utilized.

8. The system of claim 1,

wherein an insertion model is configured to connect to the plurality of POP locations in the heterogeneous WAN based on any one of obtaining network connectivity from a customer premises, securing the network connection, and routing through the heterogeneous WAN.

9. The system of claim 1, wherein the heterogeneous WAN is part of at least one of:

an intercontinental heterogeneous network comprising a union of the heterogeneous WAN and another intercontinental computer network to provide unified network coverage,

a regional heterogeneous network comprising a union of the heterogeneous WAN and a regional computer network, the regional computer network being more localized than an intercontinental computer network,

an exchange heterogeneous network configured to provide increased acceleration at a reduced cost in the heterogeneous WAN through performing of an increased acceleration in a localized region including one of the head office and the branch office using a third-party equipment, the third-party being governed by the pair-wise mutual agreement,

a vendor heterogeneous network configured to provide increased acceleration in the heterogeneous WAN through utilization of additional acceleration capabilities of a third-party vendor equipment in conjunction with the existing acceleration capabilities in the heterogeneous WAN, the third-party vendor being governed by another pair-wise mutual agreement, and

a service heterogeneous network configured to switch between external network service vendors based on proximity to at least one of the head office and the branch office, the external service vendors being governed by pair-wise mutual agreements.

10. The system of claim 1, wherein a mutual relationship between the segments of the heterogeneous WAN are established on a per flow basis to securely share resources, the flow signifying a packet flow from a source to a destination.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein segment data associated with a network service usage is collected on a packet flow from a source to a destination at least on one of a per day basis, a per week basis, a per month basis, a per link basis, and a per flow basis.

12. The system of claim 1, wherein a service abstraction and a TCP optimization is implemented in the heterogeneous WAN.

13. The system of claim 1, wherein at least one of a remediation mechanism and a repudiation mechanism configured to handle a breach of a contract is specified.

14. The system of claim 13, wherein the breach of the contract is determined to enable an initiation of the at least one of the remediation mechanism and the repudiation mechanism.

15. The system of claim 1, wherein a record associated with a network service usage is analyzed to generate an application acceleration service customer bill.

16. A method comprising:

configuring a plurality of Point of Presence (POP) locations between a head office and a branch office in a heterogeneous Wide Area Network (WAN) comprising a number of independent for-profit entities providing network services;

implementing the plurality of POP locations with a multi-segment architecture, a multi-tenancy capability in each POP location;

communicating data through a pay-per-performance peering relationship between the number of independent for-profit entities of the heterogeneous WAN through the segments thereof;

speeding up the communicated data through intelligent design of the plurality of POP locations such that each POP location has a capability to analyze a destination of a packet of the communicated data, to provide a WAN optimization and an application acceleration during the communication of the data, and to communicate the packet between the plurality of POP locations with an unaltered Internet Protocol (IP) address through at least one of a Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE), an Internet Protocol Security (IPsec), a Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS), and a Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN), wherein the WAN optimization and the application acceleration enable a distribution of a number of tasks across the WAN;

generating secured transport data through at least one of the head office and the branch office to be transmitted over at least one secure tunnel between at least one intervening firewall such that the data is routed securely through the plurality of POP locations toward a destination; and

implementing a debit-credit mechanism to handle payments as well as penalties associated with violation of a pair-wise mutual agreement between the number of independent for-profit entities providing network services in a segment of the heterogeneous WAN, wherein the debit-credit mechanism is based on at least one of a bandwidth savings and a reduced latency in the segment of the heterogeneous WAN.

17. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

wherein at least one of an accelerating operation and a routing operation of data between the segments is governed by a policy consistent with the pair-wise mutual agreement, and

wherein the number of independent for-profit entities include an application acceleration service provider.

18. The method of claim 17,

wherein the plurality of POP locations is configured to perform an application acceleration function ‘

A’

for a plurality of business entities through a placement of at least one of a collaborative document, a computed document, and a static document of an enterprise application at a closest POP location to a requesting entity, and

wherein the plurality of POP locations is shared by a plurality of licensed entities of an application acceleration service, each of the plurality of licensed entities having at least one head office and at least one branch office, and each of the plurality of licensed entities leveraging both a shared software and a shared hardware infrastructure of the application acceleration service provider.

19. The method of claim 16, further comprising:

rerouting data associated with the application acceleration during an intermediate POP failure through an alternate route associated with another POP location in the heterogeneous WAN,

wherein a service provider owns at least one of a link and an equipment to perform the application acceleration service, and

wherein the application acceleration is performed as a service without any CPE in the head office and the branch office.

20. The method of claim 16 in a form of a machine-readable medium embodying a set of instructions that, when executed by a machine, causes the machine to perform the method of claim 16.

21. A system comprising:

a heterogeneous Wide Area Network (WAN) comprising a plurality of POP locations and a number of independent entities providing network services, the heterogeneous WAN being configured to communicate data through a pay-per-performance peering relationship between the number of independent entities of the heterogeneous WAN through segments thereof, the communication of the data being sped up through intelligent design of the plurality of POP locations such that each POP location has a capability to analyze a destination of a packet of the data, to provide a multi-tenancy, to provide a WAN optimization and an application acceleration during the communication of the data, and to communicate the packet between the plurality of POP locations with an unaltered Internet Protocol (IP) address through at least one of a Generic Routing Encapsulation (GRE), an Internet Protocol Security (IPsec), a Multiprotocol Label Switching (MPLS), and a Virtual Local Area Network (VLAN), secured transport data being configured to be transmitted over at least one secure tunnel between at least one intervening firewall such that the data is routed securely through the plurality of POP locations toward a destination, and the segments being part of a multi-segment architecture implemented in the heterogeneous WAN, wherein the WAN optimization and the application acceleration enable a distribution of a number of tasks across the WAN; and

a debit-credit mechanism implemented in the system and configured to handle payments as well as penalties associated with violation of a pair-wise mutual agreement between the number of independent entities providing network services in a segment of the heterogeneous WAN, wherein the debit-credit mechanism is based on at least one of a bandwidth savings and a reduced latency in the segment of the heterogeneous WAN.

22. The system of claim 21,

wherein the number of independent entities include an application acceleration service provider,

wherein the debit-credit mechanism monitors a segment being a portion of a communication link between the number of independent entities of the heterogeneous WAN, and

wherein at least one of an accelerating operation and a routing operation of data between segments is governed by a policy consistent with the pair-wise mutual agreement.

23. The system of claim 22,

wherein the plurality of POP locations is configured to perform an application acceleration function ‘

A’

for a plurality of business entities through a placement of at least one of a collaborative document, a computed document, and a static document of an enterprise application at a closest POP location to a requesting entity, and

wherein the plurality of POP locations is shared by a plurality of licensed entities of an application acceleration service, each of the plurality of licensed entities having at least one head office and at least one branch office, and each of the plurality of licensed entities leveraging both a shared software and a shared hardware infrastructure of the application acceleration service provider.