One of the key challenges, faced by many universities worldwide, is how to enable high-speed broadband connection that can serve large number of students and researchers who need fast connectivity to the cloud to share heavy files and large databases.
The reliance on reliable high-speed internet is felt even more in many African universities, which lack proper telecom and web infrastructure making the necessity of reliable network an absolute must for research and education institutions.
The Internet has become a vital resource for the education sector, and with proper Internet access, there is almost no limit to the amount of information that can be shared and learned.
The challenge that many of educational institutions are facing is how to enhance their academic resources and optimize their networking capabilities by implementing these technologies in their schools, universities and libraries in a streamlined and budget-friendly manner. Due to declining budgets, many institutions are finding it difficult to upgrade their networks to high-speed broadband connectivity.
One African country that managed to offer suitable solution is Kenya, in which Kenya Education Network (KENET), the National Research and Education Network (NREN) of Kenya, provides high-speed Internet access and data center services to member university campuses and research facilities all across the country.
KENET has been using Telco Systems IP/MPLS technologies to build its 10GE carrier Ethernet network. After five years of successful cooperation, KENET has decided to assign Telco System to upgrade its carrier Ethernet network from 10GE to 100GE by using Telco Systems innovative T-Metro 8100 service aggregation platform and cloud compute gateway.
By upgrading its network capacity to 100GE, KENET has been able to improve the quality of existing services, offer additional advanced services and meet the growing bandwidth requirements of its education and research institution customers and their users.
KENET is one of a growing number of service providers upgrading their network capacities to 100GE. Telco Systems has been experiencing strong traction from the education vertical, among others from communication service providers supporting the US government E-Rate projects.
Realizing the importance of affordable, high-speed Internet availability in schools and libraries, Congress and the FCC implemented the E-Rate program to provide discounted telecommunications, Internet access, and internal connections to eligible schools and libraries, funded by the Universal Service Fund (USF). The E-Rate program calls now for the upgrading of existing networks to 100GE. In this respect, KENET is an excellent example for a service provider that offers the best service available in Africa and meets the highest global standards.
Telco Systems T-Metro 8100 solution is well-positioned to help network operators serving the education market space. T-Metro 8100 provides carrier Ethernet 2.0, MPLS, IP (Layer 3) and SDN (NETCONF) and offers massive service scalability and carrier class resiliency. T-Metro 8100 includes features such as QoS and OAM and is optimized for supporting native applications and utility VNFs with modular options for future expansion capabilities.
KENET carrier Ethernet network, originally supplied by Telco Systems, is now managed and orchestrated by the EdgeGenie Orchestrator service provisioning management system.
Additional resources
Learn more about the T-Metro 8100 100GE Service Aggregation Platform and Cloud Gateway
