Cisco IoT Field Network Director Data Sheet
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The Cisco IoT Field Network Director (FND) is the network management system for managing multiservice Field Area Networks (FANs), which include Cisco industrial routers, connected grid routers, gateways, and endpoints.
Features that distinguish the IoT FND are as follows:
● Ease of deployment at scale with Zero-Touch Deployment (ZTD) of IoT gateways and endpoints
● Secure and scalable end-to-end enrollment and management of gateways, endpoints, and Cisco IOx applications
● Optimization to operate on a FAN with constrained bandwidth
● Enterprise visibility into the health of gateways and endpoints
● Rich set of northbound APIs for third-party application integration
IoT FND is essential to the success of Internet of Things (IoT) solution deployments: Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), Distribution Automation (DA), Demand Response (DR), outdoor lighting, transportation, asset tracking, and LoRaWAN infrastructures. It is a proven system on which many of our customers rely every day to deliver critical infrastructure services to millions of their customers.
Cisco IoT Field Network Director is built on a layered system architecture to enable clear separation between network management functionality and applications in fleet management, asset tracking, and utility, such as a Distribution Management System (DMS), Outage Management System (OMS), and Meter Data Management (MDM). This clear separation between network management and applications helps customers deploy IoT projects incrementally, for example, by extending AMI into a utility’s DA using a shared multiservice network infrastructure and a common network management system across various utility operations. Further, a northbound API from the IoT Field Network Director allows various applications to pull and subscribe to appropriate, service-specific network communications data from a shared, multiservice communication network infrastructure. (See Figures 1 and 2.)
IoT Field Network Director operator view
Multiservice field area network and IoT FND in the head end
Core functionalities and supported devices
Table 1 describes IoT FND functionality, and Tables 2 through 4 list supported devices.
Table 1. Functionality
| Function |
Description |
| End-to-end security management |
● Fully automated, highly secure ZTD for gateways and endpoints
● Provisions mobile field technicians with time-bound security credentials to perform authorized field maintenance
● Integrates with enterprise security policies and role-based access control for network devices
● Provides device-level authentication through Authentication, Authorization, and Accounting (AAA) and RADIUS integration and alerts operators of attempted rogue device access to communication networks
● Integrates with standard Security Information and Event Management (SIEM) to help enable security and reporting needs (NERC-CIP compliance)
|
| Fault management |
● Fault event collection, filtering, and correlation for communication network monitoring
● Supports a variety of fault event mechanisms for threshold-based rule processing, custom alarm generation, and alarm event processing
● Faults can be visualized on a color-coded GIS map view for the various gateways and endpoints
● Allows operator-level custom fault event generation, processing, and forwarding to various applications, such as an outage management system
● Automatic issue tracking based on events collected
|
| Configuration management |
● Performs over-the-air software and firmware upgrades to remote endpoints
● Allows centralized configuration management, including change control enforced through operator role-based access control
● Delivers flexible device grouping options, including policy-based management and methods for deploying configuration changes
|
| Accounting management |
● Logs access information for user activity for audit, regulatory compliance, and SIEM integration
● Simplifies management and enhances compliance by integrating monitoring, reporting, and troubleshooting capabilities
|
| Performance management |
● Displays color-coded, real-time performance information on a GIS-based map
● Monitors and collects network device status and statistics
● Collects a standard set of metrics related to the operations network
● Provides a powerful threshold-based rule processing engine for exception reporting and visualization on a GIS map in real time
● Enables customized metrics collection frequency, along with historical trend reporting to suit operational needs
|
| GIS map visualization, diagnostics, and troubleshooting tools |
● Allows entire network and security management function visualization on a GIS map view for operator ease of use
● Provides a color-coded state view, enabling a network operator to easily pinpoint network regions and devices to troubleshoot
● Provides real-time troubleshooting using ping and traceroute with visual output on a GIS map, with primary metrics for each link, node, and endpoint
● Provides geo tracking for mobile gateways based on GPS coordinates
|
| Northbound API |
● Allows ease of integration for existing applications, such as OMS, MDM, trouble-ticketing systems, and manager of managers
|
Table 2. Supported gateways and endpoints
| Product name |
Product ID |
|
| Cisco 1000 Series Connected Grid Routers |
CGR1120/K9 |
CGR1240/K9 |
| Cisco 500 Series Wireless Personal Area Network (WPAN) Industrial Routers |
IR509UWP-915/K9 IR529WP-915S/K9 |
IR510-OFDM-FCC/K9 IR510-OFDM-ANZ/K9 |
| IR529UWP-915D/K9 |
IR510-OFDM-BRZ/K9 |
|
| IR529UBWP-915S/K9 |
IR530D-OFDM-FCC/K9 |
|
| IR529UBWP-915D/K9 |
IR530S-OFDM-FCC/K9 |
|
| Cisco Catalyst IR1100 Rugged Series Industrial Router |
IR1101-K9 IR1101-A-K9 |
|
| Cisco 800 Series Industrial Integrated Services Routers |
IR809G-LTE-GA-K9 IR809G-LTE-LA-K9 |
Dual LTE IR829M-2LTE-EA-AK9 |
| IR809G-LTE-NA-K9 |
IR829M-2LTE-EA-BK9 |
|
| IR809G-LTE-VZ-K9 |
IR829M-2LTE-EA-EK9 |
|
|
|
IR829B-2LTE-EA-AK9 |
|
| IR807G-LTE-GA-K9 |
IR829B-2LTE-EA-BK9 |
|
| IR807G-LTE-NA-K9 |
IR829B-2LTE-EA-EK9 |
|
| IR807G-LTE-VZ-K9 |
IR829-2LTE-EA-AK9 |
|
|
|
IR829-2LTE-EA-BK9 |
|
|
|
IR829-2LTE-EA-EK9 |
|
|
|
Single LTE IR829M-LTE-EA-AK9 IR829M-LTE-EA-BK9 IR829M-LTE-EA-EK9 IR829M-LTE-LA-ZK9 IR829B-LTE-EA-AK9 IR829B-LTE-EA-BK9 IR829B-LTE-EA-EK9 IR829GW-LTE-NA-AK9 IR829GW-LTE-VZ-AK9 IR829GW-LTE-GA-EK9 IR829GW-LTE-GA-ZK9 IR829GW-LTE-GA-CK9 IR829GW-LTE-GA-SK9 IR829GW-LTE-LA-*K9 |
|
| Cisco 819 Integrated Services Routers |
Hardened C819HG-U-K9 C819HG-S-K9 C819HG-V-K9 C819HG-B-K9 C819HG+7-K9 C819HGW+7-E-K9 C819HGW+7-N-K9 C819HGW+7-A-A-K9 C819HGW-V-A-K9 C819HGW-S-A-K9 C819HWD-E-K9 C819HWD-A-K9 C819H-K9 C819HG-4G-V-K9 C819HG-4G-A-K9 C819HG-4G-G-K9 |
Nonhardened C819G-U-K9 C819G-S-K9 C819G-V-K9 C819G-B-K9 C819G+7-K9 C819G-4G-V-K9 C819G-4G-A-K9 C819G-4G-G-K9 |
| Cisco 5900 Series Embedded Services Routers |
ESR 5921 |
|
| Cisco IC3000 Industrial Compute Gateway |
IC3000-2C2F-K9 |
|
| Cisco Wireless Gateway for LoRaWAN |
IXM-LPWA-800-16-K9 |
IXM-LPWA-900-16-K9 |
| Cisco Connected Grid Endpoint |
CGE |
|
| Cisco Catalyst IR8100 Series Industrial Router |
IR8140H-K9 |
IR8140H-P-K9 (PoE enabled) |
| Cisco Catalyst IR1800 Rugged Series Industrial Router |
IR1821-K9 IR1831-K9 |
IR1833-K9 IR1835-K9 |
Table 3. Supported head end routers
| Product name |
Product ID |
|
| Cisco Integrated Services Routers |
ISR3900 |
ISR4431 ISR4321 |
| Cisco Aggregation Services Routers |
ASR1002-X ASR1002 |
|
| Cisco Cloud Services Router |
CSR1000V |
|
| Cisco Catalyst 8500 Series Edge Platform |
C8500L-8S4X |
C8000V |
Note: IoT Field Network Director does not manage head end routers. It only monitors them for reachability and tunnel status.
Table 4. Supported third-party gateways and endpoints
| Vendor |
Product |
| Cohda Wireless |
MK5 OBU MK5 RSU |
| Itron |
OpenWay Riva ACT OpenWay Riva ACT Gateway OpenWay Riva ACT Extender OpenWay Riva BACT OpenWay Riva BACT Controller OpenWay Riva CAM1 |
| Landis+Gyr |
N2450 Gateway Revelo Endpoints M125, M225 Endpoints R661 Extender |
Cisco IoT Field Network Director License Product IDs
To deploy FND, a perpetual application license needs to be purchased along with a set of device licenses (perpetual or subscription).
Table 5 lists subscription product IDs, and Table 6 lists perpetual product IDs
Table 5. Subscription product IDs
| Subscription PID |
Description |
| IOTFND-SOFTWARE-K9 |
Top-level PID for subscription licenses for devices |
| IOTFND-EP-1K |
IoT FND subscription license for managing 1000 endpoints |
| IOTFND-BEP-1K |
IoT FND subscription license for managing 1000 battery endpoints |
| IOTFND-CGR1000 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing CGR1000 router |
| IOTFND-IR509 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing IR500 endpoints |
| IOTFND-IR1100 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing IR1101 router |
| IOTFND-IR800 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing IR800 router |
| IOTFND-IC3000 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing IC3000 gateway |
| IOTFND-C800 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing C800 router |
| IOTFND-LORAWAN |
IoT FND subscription license for managing LoRAWAN gateway |
| IOTFND-EP-100 |
IoT FND subscription license for managing 100 endpoints |
| IOTFND-CEP-1K |
IoT FND subscription license for managing 1000 cellular endpoints |
| IOTFND-IR8100 |
IoT FND Subscription License for Managing IR8100 router |
| IOTFND-IR1800 |
IoT FND Subscription License for Managing IR1800 router |
| IOTFND-N2450 |
IoT FND Subscription License for Managing L+G N2450 router |
Note: Maintenance price and IOx license are included in the pricing with subscription PIDs.
Table 6. Perpetual product IDs
| Perpetual PID |
Description |
| IOT-FND |
Top-level PID for perpetual FND application license |
| R-IOTFND-K9 |
IoT FND RPM distribution for bare metal deployment without the database |
| R-IOTFND-V-K9 |
IoT FND OVA virtual machine with Oracle DB & embedded license (recommended for RF mesh; also compatible with gateways) |
| R-IOTFND-VPI-K9 |
IoT FND OVA virtual machine with Postgres DB (recommended for gateway management) |
| L-IOTFND-GIS-3YRS |
License for GIS map |
| L-IOTFND-OPTIONKIT |
Top-level PID for perpetual device licenses |
| L-IOTFND-EP-1K |
IoT FND device license for managing 1000 endpoints including IR530 |
| L-IOTFND-BEP-1K |
IoT FND device license for managing 1000 battery endpoints (gas/water) |
| L-IOTFND-CGR1K |
IoT FND device license for managing CGR1000 router |
| L-IOTFND-IR509 |
IoT FND device license for managing IR500 endpoints |
| L-IOTFND-IR800 |
IoT FND device license for managing IR800 router |
| L-IOTFND-C800 |
IoT FND device license for managing C800 router |
| L-IOTFND-LORAWAN |
IoT FND device license for managing LoRaWAN gateway |
Note: Maintenance will need to be purchased separately with perpetual PIDs.
Recommended hardware configuration
Tables 7 and 8 list recommended generic server hardware configurations for running Cisco IoT Field Network Director software and Oracle in bare metal deployment to manage up to 8 million endpoints in an AMI use case. Table 9 & 10 recommend these configurations for gateway deployments only. Please refer to the system requirements and resource management guidelines of the latest / relevant IOT-FND release notes here for up-to-date information.
Table 7. Application server hardware requirements for routers and endpoints
| Nodes (Routers/Endpoints) |
CPU (Virtual Cores) |
Memory (RAM GB) |
Disk Space (GB) |
| 25/10,000 |
2 |
16 |
100 |
| 50/50,000 |
4 |
16 |
200 |
| 500/500,000 |
4 |
16 |
250 |
| 1,000/1,000,000 |
8 |
16 |
250 |
| 2,000/2,000,000 1 |
8 |
16 |
500 |
| 5,000/5,000,000 1 |
8 |
16 |
500 |
| 6,000/6,000,000 1 |
8 |
16 |
500 |
| 8,000/8,000,000 1 |
8 |
32 |
500 |
Table 8. Recommended Oracle DB server hardware configurations
| Nodes (Routers/Endpoints) |
CPU (Virtual Cores) |
Memory (RAM GB) |
Disk Space (GB) |
| 25/10,000 |
2 |
16 |
100 |
| 50/50,000 |
4 |
16 |
200 |
| 500/500,000 |
8 |
32 |
500 |
| 1,000/1,000,000 |
12 |
48 |
1000 |
| 2,000/2,000,000 |
16 |
64 |
1000 |
| 6,000/6,000,000 |
20 |
96 |
1000 |
| 8,000/8,000,000 |
32 |
160 |
2000 |
Tables 9 lists recommended minimum server hardware requirements for deploying a small OVA distribution of up to 25 routers.
Table 9. Recommended minimum server hardware requirements up to 25 routers with 4 and 6 cores
| Nodes (CGR1K / IR1101 / Other Field Area Supported Routers) |
CPU (Virtual Cores) |
Memory (RAM GB) |
Disk Space (GB) |
| - |
4 |
32 |
250 |
Tables 10 lists recommended server hardware for gateway management of up to 15,000 industrial routers. Please refer the release notes for latest information.
Table 10. Recommended server hardware configuration up to 15,000 industrial routers with 4 and 6 cores
| Nodes (CGR1K / IR1101 / Other Field Area Supported Routers) |
CPU (Virtual Cores) |
Memory (RAM GB) |
Disk Space (GB) |
| 15,000 |
6 |
32 |
500 |
Table 11 lists the recommended FND software packages for different use cases. For Cisco resilient mesh deployment in AMI, DA, DR, and outdoor lighting, use the package with Oracle Enterprise DB. For gateway management up to 15,000 gateways in a combination of industrial routers, industrial compute gateways, and LoRaWAN gateways, the Postgres OVA offers a simple way of getting the management system up and running.
Table 11. Recommended FND software package options for different use cases
| Use case |
Recommended software package |
| AMI and Demand Response (DR) with up to 8 million meters |
IoT FND RPM distribution for bare metal deployment (R-IOTFND-K9) plus Oracle Enterprise1 |
| Distribution Automation (DA) up to 15,000 routers OR Gateway/router management in transportation, utility, smart city (LoRa), and oil and gas with maximum of 15,000 gateways / routers |
IoT FND RPM distribution for bare metal deployment (R-IOTFND-K9) plus Oracle Enterprise1 IoT FND OVA virtual machine distribution for gateway management (R-IOTFND-VPI-K9) |
1 Customer will need to purchase the DB, separate servers & RHEL subscriptions to run FND.
2 Oracle is included in the OVA. No additional license from Oracle is required. RHEL subscription is required and not provided.
IoT FND is a critical application for monitoring and managing a connected grid. IoT FND High Availability (IoT FND HA) solutions address the overall availability of IoT FND during software, network, or hardware failures.
IoT FND provides two main levels of HA:
● IoT FND Server HA
● IoT FND Database HA
For high system throughput, high availability, server load balancing, and redundancy, we recommend having at least two servers running the Cisco IoT Field Network Director software application and two servers running the primary and secondary databases in replication mode. High availability is only supported through Oracle in bare metal deployment model referenced in Tables 7 and 8 above. Please see FND installation guides for more information on supported High Availability deployments.
Cisco Environmental Sustainability
Information about Cisco’s environmental sustainability policies and initiatives for our products, solutions, operations, and extended operations or supply chain is provided in the “Environment Sustainability” section of Cisco’s 2018 Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Report.
Reference links to information about key environmental sustainability topics (mentioned in the “Environment Sustainability” section of the CSR Report) are provided in the following table:
| Sustainability topic |
Reference |
| Information on product-material-content laws and regulations |
|
| Information on electronic waste laws and regulations, including products, batteries, and packaging |
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For more information about the Cisco IoT Field Network Director, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/fnd.
For more information about the Cisco Field Area Network solution, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/fan .
For more information about the Cisco 1000 Series Connected Grid Routers, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/cgr1000.
For more information about the Cisco 500 Series WPAN Industrial Routers, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ir500.
For more information about the Cisco 1101 Industrial Integrated Services Router, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ir1101.
For more information about the Cisco 1800 Industrial Integrated Services Router, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ir1800.
For more information about the Cisco 8100 Heavy Duty Series Router, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ir8100.
For more information about the Cisco 829 Industrial Integrated Services Routers, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ir829.
For more information about the Cisco 809 Industrial Integrated Services Routers, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ir809.
For more information about the Cisco IC3000 Industrial Compute Gateways, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/ic3000.
For more information about the Cisco LoRaWAN solution and product, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/lorawan.
For more information about the Cisco 819 Integrated Services Routers, visit https://www.cisco.com/go/m2m.
| New or revised topic |
Described in |
Date |
| Revised message |
November 25th, 2019 |
|
| Added new devices supported and new product IDs |
November 3rd, 2022 |
|
| Updated recommended hardware configuration |
November 3rd, 2022 |
|
| Added recommended hardware configuration for OVA deployments |
November 3rd, 2022 |
|
| Updated recommended software packages |
November 3rd, 2022 |
|
| Added new devices supported and new product IDs |
June 28th, 2023 |