Network Address Translation (NAT) is a way to map an entire network (or networks) to a single IP address. NAT is necessary when the number of IP addresses assigned by Internet Service Provider is less than the total number of computers that wish to provide Internet access for. Network address translation or NAT was developed in order to respond to the shortage of IP addresses with IPv4 protocol (in time the IPv6 protocol will respond to this problem). In fact, in IPv4 addressing the number of routable IP addresses (which are unique in the world) is not enough to enable all machines requiring it to be connected to the internet. The principle of NAT therefore consists of using a gateway connection to the Internet, having at least one network interface connected to the internal network and at least one network interface connected to the Internet (possessing a routable IP address), in order to connect all the machines to the network.

In today’s next-generation mobile data centers, carrier-grade NAT (CGN) or large-scale NAT (LSN) is a common approach which addresses the imminent issues of IPv4 and IPv6 network addressing interoperability and the respective challenges previously mentioned.

NexNet Solutions provides CGN/LSN capabilities which allows connecting IPv4 equipment on the premise with either IPv6 network or IPv4 network, while offering high-speed logging with no impact on performance.