Competitors
MPLS can exist in both an IPv4 and an IPv6 environment (using appropriate routing protocols). The major goal of MPLS development was the increase of routing speed. This goal is no longer relevant because of the usage of newer switching methods, such as ASIC, TCAM and CAM-based switching. Now, therefore, the main application of MPLS is to implement limited traffic engineering and layer 3 / layer 2 “service provider type” VPNs over IPv4 networks.
Similar layer 2 / layer 3 functionality is available for under 200 sites (as of Nov. 2012) with technologies like the Sophos Remote Ethernet Device (RED). Since little special equipment is required for such technologies, they are substantially less-expensive than the solutions that are more scalable.
Besides GMPLS, the main competitors to MPLS are Shortest Path Bridging (SPB), Provider Backbone Bridges (PBB), and MPLS-TP. These also provide services such as service provider layer 2 and layer 3 VPNs. L2TPv3 has been suggested as a competitor, but has not reached any wider success. Some internet providers are offering different services to customers along with MPLS. These services mainly include National Private Lease Circuit (NPLC), ILL, IPLC etc. As an example of NPLC, consider City A and City B. An organisation has an office in each city. The organisation requires connectivity between these two offices. The ISP will have access to a PoP in each city and therefore has a link between the PoPs. To connect the offices to the PoPs, a connection via the local loop will be commissioned for each office. In this way, an NPLC is delivered.
IEEE 1355 and Spacewire are a family of simplified physical-layer standards very similar in function at the hardware level to MPLS.
Read more about this topic: Multiprotocol Label Switching