CloudEthernet Forum Gets Underway

A new CloudEthernet Forum has been established to address the specific issues of scaling and applying suitable Ethernet services to meet the stringent demands of delivering cloud services.

The CloudEthernet Forum aims to provide a framework for industry stakeholders to collectively develop solutions that address technical challenges such as VLAN scaling, layer 2 performance and resilience across very large domains and consolidating storage network technologies onto Ethernet. The goal is to enable cloud service providers, carriers and enterprises to quickly and simply build and manage very large amounts of computing and storage capacity to meet the rapidly changing localized performance, scalability and regulatory requirements of cloud services.

The founding members of the CloudEthernet Forum include: Alcatel-Lucent, Avaya, Equinix, HP, Juniper Networks, PCCW Global, Spirent Communications, Tata Communications and Verizon. The CloudEthernet Forum is an MEF organization but will operate independently. New members such as systems integrators, NEMs and service providers, including leading cloud providers, are encouraged to join.

"Four years ago we migrated our Ethernet services over SDH to native Ethernet over PBB and it is proving highly popular with our datacenter customers. They love Ethernet’s simplicity and scalability and want more. However, as datacenter networks become larger and more sophisticated, they are coming up against challenges, and the CloudEthernet Forum is committed to resolving those issues," stated James Walker, president of the CloudEthernet Forum and vice president of Managed Network Services, Tata Communications

"Establishment of the CloudEthernet Forum is a reflection of Ethernet's critical position in the future of the communications industry," says Ihab Tarazi, chairman of the board of the MEF and vice president of product technology at Verizon. "Ethernet is ideal for delivering dynamic high speed bandwidth for public and private clouds with reliability, scalability and high performance."

http://www.CloudEthernet.org

The CloudEthernet Forum is an independent MEF (Metro Ethernet Forum) organization. For more information, please visit