Telstra Completes Pacnet Acquisition, Extends its SDN Globally

Telstra has completed its previously announced acquisition of Pacnet Limited, a provider of connectivity, managed services and data centre services to carriers, multinational corporations and governments in the Asia-Pacific region.

Telstra Group Executive, Global Enterprise and Services, Brendon Riley said Pacnet would be integrated into Telstra and the Pacnet brand progressively retired. Telstra will continue the development of the joint venture in China. US assets will be integrated when regulatory approval is obtained.

Telstra also announced Asia's first Software-Defined Networking (SDN) Platform will now be available to customers globally, enabling high-performance, self-provisioned dynamic network services across 25 PEN Points of Presence worldwide.

"Pacnet’s leadership in early adoption of SDN technology has allowed us to accelerate our plans and building on Pacnet’s existing sixteen PEN Points of Presence across Asia, we’ve added nine new Telstra PEN Points of Presence to create the world’s first globally connected on-demand networking Platform.

"While software, servers and storage have all become virtualised over the past decade, networks have largely remained unchanged. Telstra’s new PEN Platform reimagines the role of traditional telecommunications and enables organisations to complement traditional network approaches with SDN technology, which allows for bandwidth to be provisioned on demand, matched to application characteristics and deployed across the specific routes our customers need.

http://www.telstra.com.au/aboutus/media/media-releases/telstra-completes-acquisition-of-pacnet.xml

• In December 2014, Telstra announced plans to acquire Pacnet Limited, which owns and operates a pan-Asian submarine cable network and offers managed services and data center services to carriers, multinational corporations and governments across the region, for US$697 million acquisition is subject to completion adjustments. In addition to its submarine cables and 21 landing stations in China, Hong Kong, Japan, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan, Pacnet’s core assets comprise an integrated network with 109 PoPs across 61 cities in the Asia-Pacific region, along with 29 data centers in key locations. Seven of the data centers have Tier III accreditation. In addition, Pacnet controls two of the five fibre pairs on the Unity trans-Pacific submarine cable network connecting Japan to the United States.  In the year ended December 2013, Pacnet generated revenues of US$472m and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of US$111m. Pacnet is headquartered in both Singapore and Hong Kong with approximately 815 employees across 25 offices (including PBS China).

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Pacnet Deploys Infinera's Open Transport Switch to Virtualize Optical Network

Pacnet, which operates submarine cable systems connecting 15 cities in the Asia-Pacific region, has deployed Infinera’s new Open Transport Switch (OTS) software to extend virtualization into the optical layer of its network. Pacnet’s existing Intelligent Transport Network is based on the Infinera DTN-X packet optical transport networking platform.


Infinera’s OTS is now deployed within the Pacnet Enabled Network (PEN), which is an SDN-based service delivery platform that offers Layer 2 Ethernet services on-demand from 1 megabit per second to 10 Gbps. PEN delivers scalable bandwidth and software-enabled intelligence, allowing customers to dynamically provision bandwidth in minutes through a custom portal based on their business needs.

The combination of Infinera's DTN-X platform with the new Open Transport Switch allows PEN to offer a Layer 1 transport bandwidth on-demand service in increments of N x 10 Gbps. It is designed to allow services in increments of N x 100 Gbps for high-capacity customers in the future. The deployment runs in Hybrid Control mode, with new services leveraging bandwidth under SDN control, while existing production services continue to operate using their Infinera DNA network management system.

Pacnet said it was able to get the new OTS capabilities up and running in its PEN platform in a matter of a few months.  Pacnet is shifting into a DevOps model and Infinera is designing its optical solution for this same IT mindset. The Infinera OTS software, which leverages an open web 2.0 architecture, abstracts and virtualizes the underlying multi-layer Intelligent Transport Network taking advantage of the highly scalable and software controllable DTN-X platform. OTS then presents modern, open application programming interfaces (APIs) to enable simple programming of the transport network by any SDN controller or orchestration system.  It runs on x86 Linux server.

“In November 2013, we launched the industry’s first fully-automated, SDN-based service delivery platform, Pacnet Enabled Network, on Layer 2 Ethernet. Today, we are excited to continue to lead through innovation by bringing this capability to our optical layer," said Jim Fagan, president, managed services at Pacnet. "With this deployment, Pacnet can deliver to our customers a true Cloud experience to better utilize our unrivalled network assets.”

“The production deployment of the Infinera Open Transport Switch to support Pacnet’s innovative new service demonstrates how an open networking approach, combined with a DevOps model, reduces time to market for new services,” said Stu Elby, senior vice president, Cloud network strategy and technology at Infinera. “We believe the availability of the Infinera Open Transport Switch makes the Infinera Intelligent Transport Network the most programmable optical networking solution available, enabling our customers to rapidly develop new services with the SDN controller of their choice.”

http://www.infinera.com/j7/servlet/NewsItem?newsItemID=444


In December 2014, Telstra announced plans to acquire Pacnet Limited, which owns and operates a pan-Asian submarine cable network and offers managed services and data center services to carriers, multinational corporations and governments across the region, for US$697 million acquisition is subject to completion adjustments. In addition to its submarine cables and 21 landing stations in China, Hong Kong, Japan, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan, Pacnet’s core assets comprise an integrated network with 109 PoPs across 61 cities in the Asia-Pacific region, along with 29 data centers in key locations. Seven of the data centers have Tier III accreditation. In addition, Pacnet controls two of the five fibre pairs on the Unity trans-Pacific submarine cable network connecting Japan to the United States.

In the year ended December 2013, Pacnet generated revenues of US$472m and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of US$111m. Pacnet is headquartered in both Singapore and Hong Kong with approximately 815 employees across 25 offices (including PBS China).

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Telstra's Acquisition of Pacnet Brings Asia-Pac Submarine Cables

Telstra announced plans to acquire Pacnet Limited, which owns and operates a pan-Asian submarine cable network and offers managed services and data center services to carriers, multinational corporations and governments across the region, for US$697 million acquisition is subject to completion adjustments.

In addition to its submarine cables and 21 landing stations in China, Hong Kong, Japan, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea and Taiwan, Pacnet’s core assets comprise an integrated network with 109 PoPs across 61 cities in the Asia-Pacific region, along with 29 data centers in key locations. Seven of the data centers have Tier III accreditation. In addition, Pacnet controls two of the five fibre pairs on the Unity trans-Pacific submarine cable network connecting Japan to the United States.

In the year ended December 2013, Pacnet generated revenues of US$472m and earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation (EBITDA) of US$111m. Pacnet is headquartered in both Singapore and Hong Kong with approximately 815 employees across 25 offices (including PBS China).

Telstra Chief Executive Officer, David Thodey said the acquisition was aligned to Telstra’s growth strategy and was a significant step for Telstra as it continued to expand the business beyond Australia.

“Asia is an important part of our growth strategy. We believe this acquisition will help us become a leading provider of enterprise services to multinational companies and carriers in the region,” stated David Thodey, Telstra's CEO.  “The enterprise services market is evolving rapidly and Pacnet will strengthen our networks; data centres and submarine network as well as boosting our service offerings and people capabilities."

Pacnet Chief Executive Officer Carl Grivner said: "The addition of Pacnet’s subsea fibre network, data centre assets, capability in China, and dedicated employee base to Telstra's world-class infrastructure and management will give it the ability to accelerate business growth in the region.

http://www.telstra.com.au/
http://www.pacnet.com

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Pacnet Inaugurates Tier III Data Center in Tianjin China

Pacnet inaugurated its latest data center in China, a new facility in Tianjin (TJCS1) to address growing demand in the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei region. The new data center is strategically located in the Gaocun Science & Technology Innovation Park of the Tianjin Wuqing District in China and was developed in partnership with the Tianjin Wuqing government.

The Tier III, 226,000-square-foot facility provides colocation, connectivity and managed services backed by 24x7 expert, multilingual customer service and on-site remote hands support.  Additionally, TJCS1 boasts N+1 and 2N redundant power and state-of-the-art security, environmental and fire controls.  Customers locating in TJCS1 also obtain direct access to major domestic exchanges, Points of Presence (PoPs) and diverse carrier networks within China.

Pacnet said its new facility is SDN-enabled to give full network control to its customers to self-provision bandwidth on demand based on their business needs.

TJCS1 is connected to the Beijing data center of China International Data System (CIDS) via Pacnet Enabled Network (PEN), an industry-first service platform that leverages SDN to deliver flexible and scalable bandwidth configurable by customer

Pacnet’s data centers in China now include Tianjin, Chongqing, Shenzhen, Beijing and Shanghai.

http://www.pacnet.com/pressrelease/pacnet-opens-tier-iii-data-center-in-tianjin-china

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Pacnet Enhances Wavelength Protection of International Private Lines

Pacnet is enhancing its Wavelength Premium International Private Line (Wave Premium) service now that its 100G Asia-Pacific network upgrade has been completed. The expanded network capacity provides carriers and service providers higher availability and priority restoration capabilities through unparalleled route diversity.

Pacnet offers Service Level Agreements (SLAs) with service credits up to 100 percent of monthly service charges, and will significantly decrease restoration time when a subsea outage occurs. With multiple subsea cables connecting major markets in the region, Pacnet has the ability to provide carriers and service providers multiple route options and assurances for restoration.

“The vast majority of subsea outages are caused by external aggression, not technical defaults or other operational issues and the time required to make repairs results in significant business impact for customers,” said John Garrett, President of Carrier Services, Pacnet. “With the 100G upgrade, our capacity enables us to offer a resilient, meshed network that provides customers redundancy with multiple routes to the same destinations.”

Pacnet owns and operates Asia’s largest Trans-Pacific and intra-Asia subsea fiber optic cable network that spans 36,800 kilometers and connects to cable landing stations and Points of Presence (PoPs) in key Asian markets including Hong Kong, Singapore and Tokyo. With up to 10.24 Terabytes per second (TBps) of combined design capacity and multiple landing points in most locations, Pacnet provides customers with low latency connectivity and network resilience through increased route diversity.

http://www.pacnet.com

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Pacnet Completes 100G Upgrade on US-Japan Cable with Ciena

Pacnet has completed a 100G upgrade to its trans-Pacific link connecting the U.S. West Coast to Japan using Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform.  Pacnet is now able to offer a suite of high-capacity OTN and Ethernet services to meet customer demand while reducing cost-per-bit.

Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform, powered by WaveLogic 3 coherent optical processors, combines advanced digital signal processing with soft-decision forward error correction. In addition, Ciena’s WaveLogic 3-based submarine solution is equipped with integrated test capabilities that provide Pacnet with critical information about its network health, capacity and resilience, allowing it to leverage network resources efficiently and proactively without complex and expensive external testing gear.

http://www.ciena.com

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Pacnet Opens Flagship, Tier III Data Center in Singapore

Pacnet, which operates an extensive submarine networks across the Asia-Pacific region, officially opened CloudSpace II (SGCS2), a Tier III data center that is also designed in accordance with the BCA Green Mark scheme – the equivalent to the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) certification by the US Green Building Council.

The US$90 million facility is one of Pacnet’s flagship data centers built to help meet the rapidly growing demand for interconnected, advanced data and managed services in the Asia-Pacific region.  The eight-storey, 155,000-square foot standalone facility, offers access to Pacnet’s managed services, including Hardware-as-a-Service (HaaS) and Pacnet Enabled Network (PEN). Available in the first quarter of 2014, PEN is a Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) platform that will allow customers in the SGCS2 to manage networking services virtually and build high performance and cloud-ready networks that are cost-efficient, reliable, flexible and scalable.

The newly opened data center is carrier neutral and is directly connected to Pacnet’s submarine cable networks. It boasts fully redundant power and cooling systems, advanced fire detection and suppression systems, as well as a latest-generation security access system.

“With Singapore firmly entrenched as a dynamic financial hub, the Infocomm Development Authority’s recent push to develop into a big data hub translates into a rising need for data center services,” said Mr Giles Proctor, Vice President of Data Center Construction and Operations at Pacnet. “We are excited about launching Singapore’s first data center with Tier III Design Certification from the Uptime Institute, and continuing to grow along with the Lion City in the years ahead.”

http://www.pacnet.com

In November 2013, Pacnet announced plans for a pan-Asia Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) platform using Vello’s Connectivity Exchange software and OpenStack from Mirantis.

Pacnet Enabled Network (PEN) will provide carriers and large enterprises with the ability to provision network bandwidth on-demand across the Pacnet undersea cable system.
VellOS Connectivity Exchange also provides Pacnet with "intelligent overprovisioning."  Vello said this ensures that expensive WAN links between countries and data centers are always fully utilized and monetized via software control of data flows associated with tiered SLAs.

Pacnet will provide tiered SLAs with on-demand provisioning, just-in-time provisioning, bandwidth calendaring, and automatic path recalculation and failover. The network-as-a-service will be available via 10 data centers in Australia, Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore at launch in Q1 2014, followed by the US and China by first half of 2014, and eventually expand to all its interconnected data centers across 14 cities in the Asia-Pacific region.

In October 2013, Pacnet announced its activation of an optical mesh network with 100G on its EAC Pacific fiber optic cable system.  Pacnet can now offer its Carrier and Enterprise customers 10Gbps, 40Gbps and 100Gbps services between Asia-Pacific and the U.S.

Pacnet said its new backbone integrates subsea fiber infrastructure and terrestrial backhaul links supporting pure packet technology and OTN switching in the optical core.  The upgrade supports both Ethernet and OTN interfaces at a location, allowing flexible selection of whether to multiplex, scale up and down, amplify, groom, optically express, or switch individual data streams. 

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Pacnet Plans SDN-Powered, Pan-Asia Network Services with Vello Systems

Pacnet is building a pan-Asia Network-as-a-Service (NaaS) platform using Vello’s Connectivity Exchange software and OpenStack from Mirantis.

Pacnet Enabled Network (PEN) will provide carriers and large enterprises with the ability to provision network bandwidth on-demand across the Pacnet undersea cable system.
VellOS Connectivity Exchange also provides Pacnet with "intelligent overprovisioning."  Vello said this ensures that expensive WAN links between countries and data centers are always fully utilized and monetized via software control of data flows associated with tiered SLAs.

Pacnet will provide tiered SLAs with on-demand provisioning, just-in-time provisioning, bandwidth calendaring, and automatic path recalculation and failover. The network-as-a-service will be available via 10 data centers in Australia, Hong Kong, Japan and Singapore at launch in Q1 2014, followed by the US and China by first half of 2014, and eventually expand to all its interconnected data centers across 14 cities in the Asia-Pacific region.

“What we’ve achieved at Pacnet is a signal example of the significant economic and operational benefits that truly open systems can deliver,” said Karl May, Chief Executive Officer, Vello Systems. “The Pacnet PEN offering based on the VellOS Connectivity Exchange application represents what can be achieved in an application- and environment-aware network that can adapt dynamically to changing resource requirements of critical business applications.”

http://www.vellosystems.com/company/press-releases/pacnet-selects-vello/

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Pacnet Activates 100G Mesh on Transpacific Cable System

Pacnet has activated an optical mesh network with 100G on its EAC Pacific fiber optic cable system.  Pacnet can now offer its Carrier and Enterprise customers 10Gbps, 40Gbps and 100Gbps services between Asia-Pacific and the U.S.

Pacnet said its new backbone integrates subsea fiber infrastructure and terrestrial backhaul links supporting pure packet technology and OTN switching in the optical core.  The upgrade supports both Ethernet and OTN interfaces at a location, allowing flexible selection of whether to multiplex, scale up and down, amplify, groom, optically express, or switch individual data streams.

"We are the first carrier to support 100G service between Asia and the United States,” says Andy Lumsden, Chief Technology Officer of Pacnet.  “With this successful upgrade, we have significantly boosted our bandwidth capacity and scalability to serve the dynamic needs of carriers and enterprises that support compute-intensive operations in the region.”

http://www.pacnet.com

• EAC Pacific is a trans-Pacific cable system providing connectivity between Chikura, located off the coast of Japan near Tokyo, to Los Angeles, California and other network Points of Presence (PoPs) on the West Coast of the United States.  The two fiber pairs, collectively known as EAC Pacific, provide up to 1.92 Terabytes per second (TBps) of capacity.

• Pacnet owns and operates EAC-C2C, Asia’s largest privately-owned submarine cable network at 36,800 km, as well as EAC Pacific, which spans 9,620 km across the Pacific Ocean.  EAC-C2C connects to cable landing stations in Hong Kong, Singapore, Japan, Taiwan, Korea, the Philippines and China.
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Pacnet Signs Chinese Carriers for BGP Interconnectivity

Pacnet, which operates submarine cable systems with over 46,000 km of fiber and connectivity to interconnected data centers across 16 cities in Asia-Pac, has signed Master Service Agreements (MSAs) with each of China Telecom, China Unicom, and China Mobile for BGP Internet connectivity services that will integrate into its Internet network fabric in China.

The agreements with Pacnet’s equity joint venture in China, Pacnet Business Solutions (PBS), ensures that BGP Internet services offered will conform to internationally recognized performance standards, ensure scalable expansion opportunities for customers, and provide for service level agreements. PBS is the first Sino-foreign joint venture telecommunications service provider in China to have been awarded licenses by China’s Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT).  These licenses allow PBS to provide IP VPN services across 23 provinces in China, Internet access services in 10 cities and data center network services in 5 cities.

“This strategic partnership not only strengthens PBS’s relationship with local carriers but has also enabled us to be at the forefront of the cloud computing industry in China,” said Henry Lam, Chief Executive Officer of PBS.  “We are uniquely positioned to offer cloud service providers with reliable and seamless connectivity, flexible plans and quality of service backed by industry-leading Service Level Agreements in China.  As a leading provider of managed data connectivity solutions, we can guarantee the availability and performance of customers’ services.”

http://www.pacnet.com

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