Method for resource optimized network virtualization overlay transport in virtualized data center environments

An apparatus for determining an optimal placement of a virtual machine in a virtual data center network, the apparatus comprising:

• a circuit configured to monitor resource utilization by a plurality of virtual machines;
• a circuit configured to receive a virtual machine utilization summary from a server;
• a circuit configured to update a resource database of virtual machine utilization within the virtualized data center network based on the received virtual machine utilization summary;
• a circuit configured to receive a request associated with a first virtual machine;
• and
• a circuit configured to determine and execute an optimal placement of the first virtual machine within the virtual data center network based on the updated resource database, wherein determining the optimal placement comprises determining a data center in the virtual data center and a server in the data center that satisfies policy and resource constraints of the first virtual machine, and wherein the optimal placement is determined from a plurality of physical data centers and a plurality of physical servers in the plurality of physical data centers,
• wherein the resource database is maintained as a graph with vertices comprising servers in the virtual data center network and with edges indicating resource utilization attributes from the received virtual machine utilization summary in the graph, and wherein the determining the optimal placement comprises utilizing an optimization applied to the graph to find an optimal vertex which satisfies the policy and resource constraints of the first virtual machine, and wherein the policy and resource constraints comprise a plurality of processing power, I/O bandwidth, memory size requirement, virtual disk space limit, and application performance requirement.

A Path Computation Engine (PCE) adapted to determine an optimal placement of a virtual machine in a virtual data center network, the PCE comprising:

• one or more processors;
• and
• memory comprising instructions that, when executed, cause the one or more processors to monitor resource utilization by a plurality of virtual machines;
• receive a virtual machine utilization summary from a server;
• update a resource database of virtual machine utilization within the virtualized data center network based on the received virtual machine utilization summary;
• receive a request associated with a first virtual machine;
• and
• determine and execute an optimal placement of the first virtual machine within the virtual data center network based on the updated resource database, wherein determining the optimal placement comprises determining a data center in the virtual data center and a server in the data center that satisfies policy and resource constraints of the first virtual machine, and wherein the optimal placement is determined from a plurality of physical data centers and a plurality of physical servers in the plurality of physical data centers,
• wherein the resource database is maintained as a graph with vertices comprising servers in the virtual data center network and with edges indicating resource utilization attributes from the received virtual machine utilization summary in the graph, and wherein the determining the optimal placement comprises utilizing an optimization applied to the graph to find an optimal vertex which satisfies the policy and resource constraints of the first virtual machine, and wherein the policy and resource constraints comprise a plurality of processing power, I/O bandwidth, memory size requirement, virtual disk space limit, and application performance requirement.