5 February 2026
A significant portion of the plenary was dedicated to updates from the various Working Groups (WGs), the engines of NFV’s technical development.
- EVE WG: WG EVE reported steady progress on completing work group review on Release 6 stable drafts EVE025 (Serverless and other virtualisation forms) and EVE027 (MaaS), reopening EVE023 (New NFVI), EVE025, and continuing EVE026 (Computing Network Convergence) work items in NFV Release 7. EVE025 and EVE023 Work Item proposals were endorsed by the work group, and the scope and timing of EVE026 were updated following online discussions.
- IFA WG: WG IFA made solid progress on Release 6 Telco Cloud functional requirements specification (NFV-008-2). Release 7 stage 0/1 informative work was proposed and endorsed, covering four new Work Item proposals: one WI about Data Management in NFV and three WIs about Telco Cloud for AI. Two Release 6 final drafts, the first Release 6 specification NFV008-1 for Telco Cloud architecture and report IFA054 for GitOps in NFV, were sent for ISG approval.
- SOL WG: Good progress was made on active work items, including Generic OAM, Physical Infrastructure Management, API conformance testing, OpenAPI, and SOL001 (TOSCA-based NFV descriptors) catch-up. A new Release 6 work item on Telco Cloud CIS cluster descriptors was proposed, planned to be co-developed by both the IFA and SOL work groups as an NFV-level specification. It was also endorsed that in Release 6, IFA and SOL WGs will work together to provide both stage 2 and stage 3 work in a single document per topic, using Markdown-based documentation, with continued publication in PDF format and publication of OpenAPIs.
- SEC WG: WG SEC reported continued progress on SEC023, SEC024, and SOL023, including review of liaison input from ETSI TC CYBER EUSR. SEC023 reached final draft, while SEC024 entered stable draft. A joint WGs SEC–SOL session resolved the remaining text for SOL023, enabling further alignment across groups. SEC020, SEC025, and SEC023 were submitted as final drafts for NFV approval, with no new WIs or outgoing liaison statements.
In addition, several discussions focused on Release 5 status, Releases 6 and 7 planning, and handling multiple incoming/outgoing liaison statements. As TSC reported:
- Release 5 stages 1 and 2 work has been completed, while stage 3 has made steady progress. SOL020 is not yet ready.
- In Release 6, the Telco Cloud architecture has been defined (document ETSI NFV008-1) with ongoing work on requirements (ETSI NFV008-2) and related interfaces and procedures.
- Release 7 planning has been updated, with future work expected on serverless infrastructure, Cloud4AI and Data management in NFV.
Cross WG meetings: Two IFA/SOL cross WG sessions took place on Tuesday 9 and Wednesday 10 December 2025, to determine the technical approach to consider in Release 6 for Telco Cloud Applications (TCA) Packaging and Descriptors, TCA Config Management function capabilities, CRD-based CIS cluster descriptors and Helm Charts standardisation.
NFV-Open Session on Telco Cloud Native/AI Native: On Monday 8 December 2025, ISG NFV officials organised an open session and panel discussion. All the presentations and discussions provided valuable insights into how a Cloud-Native and AI-native Telecom network of the future can be shaped. More detailed information related to this event can be found at https://www.etsi.org/newsroom/blogs/entry/telco-cloud-ai-native-intelligent-network.
Joint workshop with ZSM and ENI, feedback from CNCC: On Wednesday 10, a joint workshop between ETSI ISG NFV, ETSI ISG ZSM, and ETSI ISG ENI took place with presentations from the ISGs regarding the technical approach to consider towards a possible merging to a new ETSI TC. CTTC also provided feedback on the latest status and discussions related to the ToR of the new ETSI TC.
The last day of the meeting several discussions took place for the future of ETSI ISG NFV, recent updates from the GSMA VENUS project, while during the closing plenary feedback and suggestions based on NOC were discussed, describing approaches to maximize NFV specification merits along the following pillars: a) align with market and operator demand for real value, b) balance the time gap between specifications development and deployment/service-in and c) stable and friendly specification aligned with open-source.
The NFV#52 plenary meeting provided a key forum for progressing telco cloud-native and AI-native technologies, as well as bridging the continuation between Release 6 and 7 work items. Through in-depth technical exchanges, strong collaboration, and a shared forward-looking roadmap, the NFV community continues to foster innovation and influence the ongoing transformation of telecommunications networks.
