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Huawei Unveils White Paper on Intelligent WANs in the AI Era

On September 17, 2026, during the much-anticipated event HUAWEI CONNECT 2026 held in Shanghai, Huawei hosted a pivotal session titled "Intelligent WAN, Building an Intelligent Connectivity Foundation." This session brought together infrastructure managers, industry leaders, and experts to discuss the critical need for establishing a framework for intelligent connectivity and the planning and deployment of intelligent Wide Area Networks (WANs) in the era of artificial intelligence (AI).

Colin Hu, Vice President of Huawei's Global Public Sector Business Unit, opened the session by emphasizing the dual challenges global networks face: expanding coverage while facilitating agile AI deployment. The rapid integration of AI across various sectors necessitates heightened demands for network security, coverage, real-time performance, and deterministic guarantees. Moreover, challenges such as gaps in network coverage and digital service disparities continue to persist, particularly in remote and underserved regions.

To address these evolving requirements, there is an urgent need to strike a balance between inclusive coverage and intelligence to lay a robust groundwork for smart WANs. Dustin Kehoe, Head of AMEA Tech Research at GlobalData, highlighted that AI's demands call for a substantial modernization of WAN architecture. Traditional networks struggle to handle the massive and unpredictable traffic required for AI, as AI workloads necessitate highly distributed infrastructure designed to process data close to its source to minimize latency and optimize bandwidth.

Intelligent WANs are increasingly expected to offer a deterministic experience backed by granular performance guarantees, and this trend is reshaping the standards for intelligent WANs. Ado, CEO of the Wide Area Network Domain at Huawei, pointed out that we are witnessing the emergence of an era defined by agent-based AI, which is shifting the network connection paradigm from users to agents. Traffic patterns are evolving, transitioning from heavy downstream traffic to massive upstream loads. Consequently, ensuring quality network experience now extends beyond specific applications to encompass the entire workflow of agents.

Traditional connectivity infrastructures must advance to provide a smart connectivity foundation that meets the demands of the AI age. Ado stressed the necessity of prioritizing high-level planning across sectors, focusing on enhancing user experience, security, and federation network equipment. To achieve improved user experiences, intelligent awareness, proactive anticipation, and precise flow planning is essential, ensuring that both users and agents receive intelligent, uninterrupted, and deterministic experiences.

The security landscape also calls for a comprehensive approach, incorporating devices with integrated security features, end-to-end encryption, quantum-resistant links, collaborative network security, and automated closed-loop management. Devices should possess built-in AI capabilities to enable resilient and intelligent connectivity, thus reinforcing the network foundation.

Ethan Liu, Vice President of Huawei's Router Domain within the Data Communication Product Line, showcased the Stellar AI integrated data WAN solution, which supports intelligent transformation through four key features: ultra-high convergent bandwidth, multi-dimensional perception, security and resilience, and network autonomy. These innovations seek to eliminate bandwidth bottlenecks, optimize compute power provision, integrate proactive defenses in networks, and transform traditional operations and maintenance into autonomous self-repair capabilities within minutes.

Nick Liu, Vice President of Huawei's Enterprise Optical Domain, highlighted Huawei's initiative for a national optical fiber network characterized by high bandwidth, flexibility, security, reliability, and intelligent operation and maintenance. Advanced technologies—such as 400G/800G standards, fully optical cross-connects (OXC), OTN-QKD integration, 50 ms WSONs, AIDAS, and NOEMate—are instrumental in building national information highways. Huawei advocates collaboration for the deployment of fully optical national backbones aimed at achieving inclusive connectivity and advancing national digital and intelligent strategies.

Throughout this session, leading experts from various fields shared best practices and insights for planning and deploying networks. During this significant event, Huawei, in partnership with GlobalData, published the "Intelligent WAN White Paper in AI Era," offering a systematic analysis of industry trends, target WAN architecture, and its evolutionary roadmap in the AI landscape, ultimately assisting clients in accelerating their transitions towards agent-based AI.

Looking ahead, Huawei is committed to leveraging its strengths in network infrastructure, collaborating with partners and clients to foster intelligent transformation across all business domains in the AI era.