In the first phase of upgrading its global network, Cable & Wireless (www.cw.com) tomorrow will activate trans-Atlantic OC-192 links using multi-protocol label switching to connect seven cities in the United States, United Kingdom and Europe.
“This will expand what we can offer. With that traffic engineering core, we can now define services at the edge of the network,” David Garbin, senior director of strategic network planning at Cable & Wireless, told XCHANGE. The new services the company plans to offer include traditional IP services and IP VPNs.
With its upgraded network, Cable & Wireless will also be able to offer streaming and premium content services in conjunction with Digital Island, its managed hosting and content delivery subsidiary, and Exodus Communications Inc., which Cable & Wireless is in the process of acquiring.
Eventually, Garbin says, Cable & Wireless will offer corporate, retail and wholesale voice services over its network. MPLS “is almost a prerequisite for offering voice,” he adds. “You need low delay and low jitter, and [MPLS] allows you to engineer the delay for voice services.”
In this first step of the network upgrade, the OC-192 using MPLS links will connect Washington, D.C., and New York City with Amsterdam, Brussels, Frankfurt, London and Paris. By March 2002, Garbin said he expects to add five more OC-192 nodes across the U.S. Eventually Cable & Wireless will expand its MPLS capabilities into Japan.
