Multi-Period Cost Modeling and SKU-Based Allocation Scheme in Telco and Service Edge–Cloud Platforms

The calculation of costs for a complex edge–cloud platform operated by a telecommunications provider, which both manages networks and delivers communication and cloud services, is of fundamental importance. This work systematically addresses the evaluation of CapEx and OpEx, and thus the total cost of ownership, from a multi-period perspective for fully on-premises or hybrid edge–cloud platforms, including multi-cloud options. It also considers the computation of hourly costs of elementary resource units (e.g., vCPU), enabling cost allocation to applications and supporting service pricing. The proposed model and methods are general and adaptable to different contexts, requiring only the population of the data model and, as a next step, the platform instantiation for specific cases. The approach enables comparative analyses of multi-period deployment alternatives, including different degrees of decentralization, varying shares of public cloud resources, and sensitivity analyses on key parameters, particularly infrastructure costs. This work is developed within the IPCEI-CIS TIM Edge–Cloud Continuum project and currently is in the research phase, without application in TIM’s operational or commercial domains.