Monday, October 1, 2012

Internet2's 100G Backbone Open for SDN


Internet2's new 100G-enabled and 8.8 Terabit per second optical network is now operational for member institutions.
The new capabilities now available on the Internet2 Network include:
  • An upgraded Advanced Layer 3 Service, that will provide extraordinary broadband capabilities for science, medicine and education not only to the higher education community, but also to hundreds of thousands of community anchor institutions through partnerships with regional networks and Internet2's United States Unified Community Anchor Network (U.S. UCAN) project.
  • A nationwide 100 Gbps Software Defined Network offering both production services like the Layer-2 Open Science, Scholarship and Service Exchange built in partnership with Indiana University and support of new network innovations through software defined networking support.
  • Over 8.8 Tbps of optical network capacity through 88, 100 Gbps-waves that are delivered in a unique partnership, between Internet2 and the Department of Energy's Energy Sciences Network (ESnet) that will share this capacity and operations of the infrastructure to advance national programs.

"We are excited about officially launching the new capabilities of the nation's first 100G open, national-scale, software-defined network through massive collaboration with our partners in government and business that will be used by Internet2 members to help solve practical, far-reaching problems that benefit society," said Internet2 CEO and President H. David Lambert. "We look forward to seeing the collaboration of our community using this dynamic network to advance education, transform university business models, and accelerate global Big Data collaborative research outcomes. When we equip the research and education community with great technology and no barriers to innovation, that's when they start creating the future."

  • Earlier this year, Internet2 formed partnerships with 16 leading technology companies to provide cloud services to college campuses across the U.S.
  • Cloud partners include Aastra; Adobe; Box; CENIC; Dell; Desire2Learn; Duo Security; DuraSpace; Evogh; HP; Level 3 Communications; Merit Network, Inc.; Microsoft; Savvis, a CenturyLink Company; SHI International; and The Solution Design Group.

    "These major cloud service partnerships are customized to meet the needs of the Internet2 community and these offerings range in stages from incubator, proof-of-concept, early adopter and general availability," said Dave Lambert, Internet2 CEO and president. "No other organization in the United States is able to offer this level of collaboration between higher education and the technology industry to launch these strategic cloud services to effectively and efficiently advance research, innovation and the education mission of our nation's leading universities."