Telecom operator AT&T announced its deal to buy the Vyatta network operating system and related assets of Brocade Communications Systems.

The strategy of AT&T is to reduce costs associated with its network.

This acquisition will bolster AT&T’s ability to deliver cloud or premises-based VNFs, starting with the previously announced SD-WAN cloud service with VeloCloud.

The acquisition of Vyatta will also expand AT&T’s white box platform capabilities. In March, AT&T completed a trial with companies to design and build its own white box switches to manage data traffic more efficiently across its network.

AT&T, which is enhancing network transformation efforts, aims to hire some Brocade employees — mostly located in California and the United Kingdom. AT&T said the Vyatta platform will help the telecom company to drive its network transformation.

“We expect to virtualize and software-control 75 percent of our network by 2020. Our plan is to hit 55 percent by the end of 2017,” said Andre Fuetsch, chief technology officer and president of AT&T Labs.

AT&T will own the Vyatta network operating system, including its virtual network functions (VNFs) and distributed services platform, software under development as part of its unreleased roadmap, existing software licenses, and patents and patent applications.