This brings up several issues for me surrounding virtualized network components that I haven't yet seen addressed. The first being how do software-implemented network functions stackup up against ASIC-implemented network functions in terms of performance? Is a VEM, for example, faster than a linecard? I'm sure in terms of east-west traffic it's as fast if not faster, but what about traffic exiting and leaving the area served by the VEMS - north/south traffic?

Anyone who has worked with cisco equipment has seen that the biggest advancements in terms of performance often happen when functions are moved from software to custome hardware. So if those are moved back into software, isn't that a step back in time?

So yes idle compute cycles are an opportunity to virtualize, but the just doesn't extend logically to the network. Unused bandwidth isn't an opportunity to virtualize network components.

However, when all you have is a hammer, as the saying goes, everything looks like a nail. Or a cloud in this case. So it seems like what to virtualize and where to leverage hardware is a topic not yet hashed out.