AT&T has announced the latest addition to the inner circle of partners which will help it adopt SDN (software-defined networking) throughout its organization over time. The telco is working with Broadcom in an alliance focused on software-driven innovation at silicon level. Initially the initiative will center on the wireline network, but AT&T has aggressive plans to extend its SDN and virtualization right out to the RAN. In that context, the Broadcom partnership is highly strategic, and also sounds some warning bells for Intel, which is positioning itself as the natural chip platform for the new virtualized networks. Susan Johnson, SVP of global supply chain at AT&T, told LightReading: “Working with chipset providers allows us to guide innovation at the chipset…