Network News: Zayo Delivers One Terabit per Second at SC13

Zayo delivers one terabit per second at the Supercomputing 2013 (SC13) conference in Denver, and expands its presence in Miami; Penguin Computing releases open network switches; and Level 3 expands in Columbia.

Zayo connects SC13 and expands in Miami.  Zayo delivered one terabit per second (1Tb/s) super-channel transmission capacity in support of the SCinet network for SC13  this week. Using the Infinera DTN-X platform, Zayo demonstrated the rapid provisioning of 100 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) services from the show floor in Denver to Chicago. SCinet is a specialized network created each year to support the conference. "The delivery of terabit service on SCinet demonstrates how fast Zayo can deploy capacity for our customers," said David Dunn, vice president of wavelength product at Zayo. "Through our collaboration with Infinera on this deployment, we are demonstrating our ability to expand our 100GbE services to accommodate the bandwidth-driven needs of our customers.” Zayo also announced expansion of services in the Miami market. zColo, Zayo’s colocation business unit, is constructing its newest facility in downtown Miami and building out a metro fiber network into Zayo’s existing Miami location. zColo will occupy 24,000 square feet of colocation space on the 7^th floor of the DRT building, supporting up to 4 megawatts of utility power with a fully redundant (N+1) power and cooling infrastructure.

Penguin Computing releases open switches.  Penguin Computing announced the future availability of the new Arctica 3200xl open network switch based on the Broadcom StrataXGS Trident II chipset. The Arctica 3200xl adds 32-port 40 Gigabit Ethernet capability to the Arctica family and enables up to 96 servers and storage systems to be connected over 10 Gigabit Ethernet to a single Top-of-Rack switch, while supporting 40 Gigabit Ethernet uplinks for aggregation. It also offers new high port count 10 Gigabit Ethernet options to support ultra high density rack form factors, such as Penguin OpenHPC. “For the bandwidth intensive applications encountered in HPC clusters and Internet Data Centers, the new Arctica 3200xl switch makes 40 Gigabit Top-of-Rack (ToR) architecture economical and practical,” said Charles Wuischpard, CEO Penguin Computing. “All Arctica switches are open and support the Software Defined Networking (SDN) model. Penguin recommends Cumulus Linux which provides rich set of Linux based orchestration and automation tools.”

Level 3 expands in Columbia.  Level 3 Communications (LVLT) announced the expansion of its data center infrastructure with the completion of its newest data center in Bogota, Colombia. The new facility adds 1,700 square meters to Level 3’s current data center complex in Bogota and was built in response to growing regional demand for world-class network and IT services as enterprises increasingly adopt cloud-based applications. “Demand for colocation, housing, hosting and value-added services continues to grow in Colombia as the adoption of cloud-based applications increases,” said Gabriel del Campo, Level 3's senior vice president of Data Centers for Latin America. “As a result, companies are increasingly looking to outsource these services to ensure they can capitalize on efficient cloud solutions and remain focused on their core business objectives. Level 3's data center services range from traditional network equipment hosting to comprehensive support for managed IT solutions, helping position enterprises for successful growth amid a dynamic global marketplace.”