OpenColo carries 1.6 Tbps using Nokia's 800GE link aggregation

OpenColo, a data center operator based in Santa Clara, California, transported a 1.6 Tbps traffic flow over an 800GE link aggregation group with 800GE FR4 optics. 

The field trial included the Nokia 7750 SR-1se router equipped with FP5 silicon to enable 800GE interfaces, and the Nokia 1830 PSI compact modular optical transport platform equipped with Photonic Service Engine (PSE) coherent interfaces. 

Nokia says this trial marks the industry-first application of 800GE link aggregation for high-capacity data center interconnect, including both full link resiliency with coherent optical transport.

Scott Brookshire, Co-founder and CTO at OpenColo, said: “At OpenColo, we constantly strive to push the limits of what's achievable to anticipate the ever-evolving demands of our valued customers and the market. With Nokia's groundbreaking release of 800GE, we had full faith in their ability to provide us with seamless line rate performance of 1.6 Tb/s without any packet loss. True to our expectations, Nokia delivered on this promise.”

Jeff Jakab, Vice President, IP Hardware Product Management at Nokia, said: “We are pleased to achieve this important milestone with OpenColo as it further demonstrates the maturity and added value of our 800GE routing technology to solve real customer challenges today and tomorrow. The economic advantages of 800GE in comparison to 400GE are clear, being cost neutral to 400GE today and providing up to a 40 percent power savings versus 400GE today. Adopting 800GE routing is a simple and clear solution to the immediate power concerns our industry faces.”

https://www.nokia.com/about-us/news/releases/2023/04/03/nokia-expands-opencolos-data-center-site-connectivity-using-800ge-routing-interfaces/

Read More

Verizon lands $2 billion contract with FAA

Verizon was awarded a 15-year contract valued at over $2 billion to design, build, secure, integrate and operate a new telecommunications network.

Under the terms of the Federal Aviation Administration Enterprise Network Services (FENS) contract, Verizon will build the FAA a dynamic, highly available and secure enterprise network to support all of the agency's mission critical applications across the National Airspace System (NAS), which includes providing Air Traffic Management (ATM) to more than 45,000 flights and 2.9 million airline passengers traveling across the more than 29 million square miles that make up the U.S. national airspace system.

“This is an incredible opportunity for Verizon to lead the nation’s largest government transportation agency through a telecommunications infrastructure transformation that utilizes the latest advances in technology and networking solutions,” said Kyle Malady, Verizon Business CEO. “From dynamic services and bandwidth provisioning, to improved insight and visibility into network service configuration and operation, we are excited to help the FAA with a robust solution that will benefit the National Airspace System and administrative users alike.”

FENS is the successor to the FAA Telecommunications Infrastructure (FTI) contract, which was implemented in 2002 to provide consolidated telecom services for the 5,000 facilities and 30,000 circuits in the NAS. By extension, FENS will serve as the primary means for FAA's telecommunications services and forms the basic infrastructure for the Next Generation Air Transportation System, or NextGen.

Additionally, the new enterprise platform managed by Verizon will provide the FAA with features such as dynamic service provisioning and reconfiguration, survivability, on-demand Service Flow routing.

https://www.verizon.com/about/news/verizon-public-sector-wins-federal-aviation-administration-fens-contract

Read More

Oman Emirates Gateway subsea cable project gets backing

Omantel, in collaboration with UAE-based du, announced plans to build a 275-km submarine cable to serve as an express connection between both countries.

The Oman Emirates Gateway (OEG) that will connect two international data centres - Equinix MC1 in Barka, Oman and datamena DX1 in Dubai, UAE.

Talal Al Mamari, CEO of Omantel, said, “I am glad to announce this partnership with du. This direct and dedicated corridor will synergise the goals of Omantel as the global wholesale hub and of du as the regional data hub, bringing huge benefits to our Wholesale and Enterprise customers. Both companies will also be able to further expand their networks with higher efficiency and improved connectivity which will result in a significant positive impact in terms of services quality and product variety.”

“The importance of this partnership is reflected by the fact that it is the first of its kind regional fibre optic submarine cable which connects two international data centres - Equinix MC1 in Barka, Oman and datamena DX1 in Dubai, UAE. This link will act as a major facilitator for hyperscalers, content providers and international carriers that are currently hosted in these datacentres to avail improved connectivity services and higher capacities and will be able to directly link their Point of Presence (POPs) in the region. Increased connectivity between the two data centres will also attract more global players to the region, improve the quality of connectivity, which will in turn, boost customer experience,” Al Mamari added.

https://www.omantel.om/

Read More

NTT suffers optical network outage

NTT East and NTT West suffered a rare network outage on Monday, 03-April-2023, beginning at 07:10am and impacting optical lines in Tokyo and several prefectures.

The outage hit as many as 359,000 internet lines and 186,000 landline telephone services. Service restoration took between 90 minutes to more than 2 hours.

The cause of the outage is under investigation. NTT Docomo and SoftBank Corp. also reported service disruptions on Monday due to the optical line problem.

Read More

Midjourney runs its text-to-image AI on Google Cloud

Midjourney, the independent research lab that provides amazing text-to-image generative AI, has selected Google Cloud as its infrastructure provider of choice for training its large-scale AI models.

As part of the partnership, Midjourney has employed Google Cloud's custom-developed AI accelerators, Tensor Processor Units (TPUs), to train its fourth generation AI model. In combination with Google Cloud's GPU VMs, which run on NVIDIA GPUs, Midjourney can render the generated images on the platform with breathtaking speed.

"We're proud to provide incredible tools for our creative community using Google's global and scalable infrastructure," said David Holz, founder and CEO of Midjourney. "From training the latest versions of our algorithms on the v4 TPUs with JAX, to running inference on huge clusters of GPUs, we have been happy working with Google as a partner."

"As AI opens the door for innovation across industries, companies like Midjourney are choosing Google Cloud to take advantage of our open, flexible, and performant infrastructure, which runs with incredible scale and efficiency," said Amin Vahdat, VP/GM Systems and Services Infrastructure, Google Cloud. "We are excited to see the Midjourney community create impressive imagery thanks to our industry-leading offerings."

https://midjourney.com

https://www.googlecloudpresscorner.com/2023-03-14-Midjourney-Selects-Google-Cloud-to-Power-AI-Generated-Creative-Platform

Read More

EdgeCore Digital expands data center presence in northern Virginia

EdgeCore Digital Infrastructure, a wholesale data center operator that was recently acquired by  Partners Group, unveiled plans to develop a new data center campus on 7.6 acres centrally located in the heart of data center alley in northern Virginia. The project will be co-developed with Penzance, a Washington, D.C. based real estate developer.  The site supports customers seeking high-performance capacity with low-latency access to leading cloud hubs and supporting network access across Northern Virginia.  

This newly acquired parcel is planned to accommodate a 285,000 square foot, three-story data center, capable of supporting 36 MW of critical load. The site plan approval process is expected to be completed by the end of 2023. A dozen local and national long-haul fiber providers are located adjacent to the site, making EdgeCore’s newest data center location in Northern Virginia an attractive option for leading cloud and internet companies.

EdgeCore’s existing site in Northern Virginia, comprised of348,000 square feet and capable of supporting 54 MW of critical load, is located just two miles from this newly acquired land. Combined, both EdgeCore data center sites provide 633,000 square feet of space and 90 MW of critical load to customers seeking space in the world’s most vital data center market.

“With the acquisition of additional land in Northern Virginia, EdgeCore adds another key data center location to our portfolio and continues to advance our focus on rapid growth and development in key datacenter markets,” said Lee Kestler, CEO, EdgeCore. “We are pleased to have partnered with Penzance on this project and are grateful for the acceleration they are bringing to the process through their deep regional expertise and connections.”

https://www.edgecore.com/blog

Read More

PacketFabric and Unitas Global complete merger - NaaS

PacketFabric and Unitas Global completed their previously-announced merger. 

PacketFabric helps businesses build new secure, private network fabrics to connect their core sites, cloud assets and manage shifts in data gravity with their unique fabric integrated storage. PacketFabric Converge orchestrates on-demand connectivity across colocation facilities, cloud providers, and private network interconnection across the globe.

Unitas Global offers intelligent automation for business internet connectivity, providing end-to-end network design, pricing, ordering and visibility across more than one thousand first/middle/last mile networks, accessing more than 50 million fiber lit buildings.

The new PacketFabric said it is focused on being "the premier Network as a Service (NaaS) provider, offering extensive capabilities in both public and private transport for enterprises, global channels and technology partners."

https://packetfabric.com/

Read More

Ericsson and Intel partner on 5G use cases in Malaysia

 Ericsson and Intel agreed to collaborate on the development of 5G use cases that can accelerate digitalization in Malaysia as well as spur the adoption of the new technology by enterprises in Malaysia.

David Hägerbro, Head of Ericsson Malaysia, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, says: “5G is a platform for innovation and will transform the way enterprises operate. Ericsson’s collaboration with Intel in Malaysia will contribute to the adoption of 5G and development of the local ecosystem that will in turn drive Malaysia’s digital transformation.”

AK Chong, Managing Director of Intel Malaysia, says: “With the increasing digitalization of our society and economy, 5G is becoming a fundamental component to drive innovation across all business segments. This collaboration demonstrates how the Malaysian 5G infrastructure with innovative edge services – powered by Ericsson and Intel technologies – enables local enterprises to transform and accelerate their businesses through digital solutions.”

Read More

Australia's NBN Co expands fixed wireless access

Around 24,000 homes and businesses across regional Australia are now eligible to access the nbn® fixed wireless network for the first time. The locations of the 24,000 premises have been selected based on their proximity to existing nbn fixed wireless towers, with priority given to those located in the most heavily used parts of the nbn satellite footprint. 

The upgrade is being enabled by a $750 million investment – including $480 million from the Australian Government and $270 million from nbn.

NBN Co plans to introduced two new wholesale higher speed plans.

Gavin Williams, nbn Chief Development Officer for Regional and Remote, states: “We are in the middle of the next evolution of the nbn fixed wireless network to extend its reach and capability and bring improved service deeper into rural and regional Australia. The nbn fixed wireless network is the digital backbone for many regional Australians. With more people living in regional areas, connectivity has never been more important and that is why we are not just responding to existing demand, but also planning for the future. We expect that by around the end of 2024, the upgrades we are making across the nbn fixed wireless network will enable around 750,000 homes and business to enjoy better broadband, which will allow more people to be online at the same to work, study, and stream with less buffering.” 

Read More