This chapter provides a solid foundation for Software-Defined Networking (SDN) concepts and other supporting technologies. Its characteristics are covered in this chapter as well as the various applications of SDN on production networks. Finally, Network Function Virtualization (NFV), a concept often mixed up with SDN, is explored and the differences between SDN and NFV are explained in details.

In this chapter, we will cover the following topics:

• What is SDN?
• SDN use cases
• NFV