RedIRIS taps ADVA and SIA to upgrade national research network

News summary:

• Universities and research centers across Spain looking to access next-generation applications
• ADVA’s open optical networking solution enables seamless transition from legacy equipment
• Nationwide research and education network now delivering Ethernet services up to 100Gbit/s

ADVA (FSE: ADV) and SIA, Indra’s cybersecurity company, today announced that RedIRIS is deploying ADVA’s technology to create a robust, high-capacity research and education network (NREN). The new long-haul backbone infrastructure connects universities and research facilities across Spain, enabling educators and scientists to share huge data sets and harness bandwidth-intensive applications. Built on the ADVA FSP 3000 and monitored by the ADVA ALM fiber assurance solution, the network carries services at speeds up to 200Gbit/s. Featuring ADVA’s ROADM technology and QuadFlex™ line cards, the open solution has given RedIRIS an easy way to migrate from legacy technology to flexible, high-performance connectivity.

“Our new transport system empowers Spain’s scientists and academics to work together on national and international projects under optimum conditions. With flexible coherent wavelengths up to 200Gbit/s, it provides secure, highly reliable access to everything from video conferencing tools to high-performance remote computing facilities,” said Esther Robles, head of communications networks, RedIRIS. “ADVA’s open FSP 3000 technology enabled a smooth and painless transition from our existing transport infrastructure. With its modular design, it also provides massive scale, giving us the freedom to easily expand and evolve our network to meet future needs.”

Connecting more than 80 points of presence and over 500 institutions, RedIRIS’s new backbone network includes long-haul single-span submarine links to Spain’s Balearic Islands and the city of Melilla, as well as connections to the Canary Islands, the Canarian Institute of Astrophysics and its observatories. For flexibility and high spectral efficiency, the solution features ADVA’s flexgrid multi-degree ROADMs, enabling high-speed coherent and high baud-rate transport. Through ADVA’s MicroMux™ technology, the new infrastructure also supports a seamless mix of 10Gbit/s and 100Gbit/s Ethernet client ports without any footprint increase. This optimizes space efficiency and ensures no stranded bandwidth. The network upgrade also involved the deployment of a solid and thorough migration plan by SIA, a leading Indra company in cybersecurity and ADVA’s Select partner.

“RedIRIS’s long-haul infrastructure is now one of Europe’s most advanced NRENs. It will enable researchers and teachers in Spain to leverage a new breed of data-intensive applications and collaborate in new ways using innovative video conferencing and augmented reality tools,” commented Hartmut Müller-Leitloff, SVP, sales, EMEA, ADVA. “Our open and scalable technology efficiently bridges the gap between the legacy needs and the future demand of RedIRIS’s users. Its unique client port flexibility supports a mix of 10Gbit/s and 100Gbit/s Ethernet services without the need for additional hardware. With our open optical layer, RedIRIS is also free to tackle rising demands in the future by expanding to higher baud rates and more complex modulation schemes.”

“For the design and deployment of a complex project like this, it has been key to walk hand in hand with our client RedIRIS, to perfectly understand its requirements and choose the right professionals with the knowledge and capacity to migrate to a new network that meets the organization’s present and future needs for a wide range of services. The project allows RedIRIS to carry encoded critical services that assure a greater level of cybersecurity with no latency,” stated Alejandro Díez, director, digital risk, SIA. “This deployment gives RedIRIS’s users in the research and scientific community an extremely powerful tool for high-quality collaboration and global connectivity. It also prepares Spain’s NREN for the key challenges of the future as it looks to connect more schools, universities, research centers, global libraries, smart cities and IoT. RedIRIS will operate as a critical infrastructure and will assure an immediate communication service with any other geographic point of the network, with robust processes and higher cybersecurity.”