Advantages of Running IPv6 in MPLS Core

[NAVIN PARWAL]

Folks,

Cisco has 6PE solution for providers who have IPv4 backbones running MPLS and want to add support for IPv6.

My question is what is a New SP who wants to enable IPv6 in the backbone ( Loopback IP address, Ospf V3, IPv6 MPBGP,etc). Would this SP have any advantage???

To the best of my knowledge cisco still does not support MPLS VPN for IPv6, customer isolation is done using prefix list, I know juniper has support, any thoughts on why cisco still does not support IPv6 Vrf and if it has any plans to do it in the future would be hiighly appreciated?

Thanks

[Harold Ritter]

I see two questions in your posting.

1- What is the advantage of running IPv6 native all over your backbone.

The answer to that is it depends. If you are a transit provider only providing IPv6 to your customer then I see no advantage in running IPv6 natively in the backbone as 6PE does an excellent job at that. If you are a content provider then it is a different story.

2- MPLS VPN for IPv6 (aka 6VPE). This feature will be supported in the near feature. For more information on the road map, please contact your account team.

Hope this helps,

[NAVIN PARWAL]

Many thanks for your response. Would appreciate your response on the following:

1) If we are not a transit provider, would enabling IPv6 natively in the backbone benefit in anyway. Would tag switching work with IPV6 address? Do We still be able to support IPv4 Vrfs.

2) Since aka 6VPE is not supported by Cisco at this time, what is the best way to isolate customer traffic(IPv6) from one another?(Prefix list?)

Thanks

[Harold Ritter]

1) Native IPv6 traffic will not be label switched since LDP and RSVP for IPV6 are not available yet.

2) I guess prefix list could be used. Are you seeing a big demand for it. I would probably wait for 6vpe availability.

Hope this helps,

[NAVIN PARWAL]

One of the best responses I have read so far on this forum. Please could you clarrify:

1) If my backbone was all IPv6 and i enabled tag-swicthing, I will not see labal assignment as LDP is not yet supported with IPv6?

2) If prefix list is not the right answers, How are providers supporting Ipv6 support for customers. I mean what i understand Vrf is not supported for IPv6 right now, even with 6PE configuration how does a provider isolate customer traffic from each other?

Thanks