The technological leap of smart technologies and the Internet of Things has advanced the conventional model of the electrical power and energy systems into a new digital era, widely known as the Smart Grid. The advent of Smart Grids provides multiple benefits, such as self-monitoring, self-healing and pervasive control. However, it also raises crucial cybersecurity and privacy concerns that can lead to devastating consequences, including cascading effects with other critical infrastructures or even fatal accidents. This paper introduces a novel architecture, which will increase the Smart Grid resiliency, taking full advantage of the Software-Defined Networking (SDN) technology. The proposed architecture called SDN-microSENSE architecture consists of three main tiers: (a) Risk assessment, (b) intrusion detection and correlation and (c) self-healing. The first tier is responsible for evaluating dynamically the risk level of each Smart Grid asset. The second tier undertakes to detect and correlate security events and, finally, the last tier mitigates the potential threats, ensuring in parallel the normal operation of the Smart Grid. It is noteworthy that all tiers of the SDN-microSENSE architecture interact with the SDN controller either for detecting or mitigating intrusions.

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Through the advanced coordination and orchestration realised within the wider SESAME project concept, a new architecture has been defined and proposed, aiming to attend several operators/service providers and “engage” them in a modern multi-tenant ecosystem, so that to fully serve the broader vision of the 5G; in particular, this takes place by emphasizing upon the incorporation” of network intelligence and applications in the network edge through NFV and cloud computing and by promoting the effective use of the Small Cell concept. This modern 5G-based context influences the related market sector and leads to a multiplicity of business challenges and growth opportunities for the involved actors/players. Moreover, we assess and analyze forthcoming business perspective based on a dedicated proposed business model that strongly identifies the raising potential for growth.

Optics InfoBase is the Optical Society's online library for flagship journals, partnered and copublished journals, and recent proceedings from OSA conferences.

A technoeconomic evaluation of the business prospects of a wide-scale deployment of free space optical (FSO) technology as a last-mile solution is carried out. The evaluation is based on a technoeconomic tool that taking into account network topology, area characteristics, service demand, and price evolution forecasts, estimates key economic figures-of-merit. It is shown that FSO technology could provide a viable alternative in situations where the duct availability is limited, and fiber-to-the-home/office or fiber-to-the-cabinet scenarios have negative or less favorable business prospects. Hybrid fiber/FSO scenarios are also investigated taking into account different FSO coverage conditions.