A Highly Scalable IoT Architecture through Network Function Virtualization

As the number of devices for Internet of Things (IoT) is rapidly growing, existing communication infrastructures are forced to continually evolve. The next generation network infrastructure is expected to be virtualized and able to integrate different kinds of information technology resources. Network Functions Virtualization (NFV) is one of the leading concepts facilitating the operation of network services in a scalable manner. In this paper, we present an architecture involving NFV to meet the requirements of highly scalable IoT scenarios. We highlight the benefits and challenges of our approach for IoT stakeholders. Finally, the paper illustrates our vision of how the proposed architecture can be applied in the context of a state-of-the-art high-tech operating room, which we are going to realize in future work