Written by Andrew Wooden
Nokia Bell Labs is showcasing an AI proof of concept called Natural-Language Networks, an ‘industry-first research breakthrough’ that will allow networks to be operated via speech or text prompts.
Dubbed as a technology that will make networks ‘truly anonymous’, Natural-Language Networks is a proof of concept combining natural language processing and AI/ML models that is supposed to interpret text or speech requests and automatically allocate the right combination of network resources.
By doing so, Natural-Language Networks will apparently ‘eliminate the complexity of managing networks, while also enabling much more responsiveness to end user’s needs’. Operators will be able to deliver and maintain the ‘ideal network configuration’ for any customer the moment it is requested, says Nokia.
“These networks will understand the intention of users and have the intelligence to act upon them autonomously,” claims the release.
The system is also supposed to learn from its actions and optimise the network further with each request. As more knowledge is gathered, it can apparently anticipate service and application needs and self-adapt to them without the need for any human intervention.
The proof of concept, which is currently being demonstrated at the Brooklyn 6G Summit, is a component of a new Nokia Bell Labs research initiative called UNEXT. This has the not immodest goals of redefining network software and systems ‘the same way UNIX reshaped computing’, and ‘evolving the network itself into an OS.’
