Verizon Business Customers to Benefit From Global Network Expansion, Enhancements
February 9, 2009
Company Further Strengthens Foundation for Delivering Communications, IT and Security Solutions Worldwide
BASKING RIDGE, NJ – February 9, 2009 – Verizon Business in 2009 will further strengthen its unsurpassed global network foundation for delivering communications, IT and security solutions to business and government customers worldwide.
To enable global enterprise customers to turn new challenges into new opportunities, Verizon Business continues to invest in network projects in nearly every region of the world – from the U.S., Canada and Mexico to Australia, India, China and Japan; from Europe to the Middle East and Africa. In 2008, Verizon Communications invested $17.2 billion in its wireline and wireless networks worldwide.
Our global customers expect us to be where they need us, when they need us, and to offer services and solutions that support their critical business applications around the world, said Ihab Tarazi, vice president of global network planning for Verizon. In this challenging economy, many multinational customers are looking for ways to collaborate more efficiently and effectively across their multiple offices around the world.
Verizon Business’ enterprise network spans six continents and delivers services to customers in 2,700 cities and more than 150 countries, including 96 percent of the Fortune 1000, and more than 75 U.S. government agencies and numerous state agencies. In 2008 Verizon Business sales of strategic enterprise services – such as security and IT solutions, and professional and managed Internet protocol (IP) services – increased 16 percent over 2007.
Said Tarazi, With the increasing demand for our strategic services and IP-based solutions, we continue our aggressive network investment, which allows us to provide one of the most robust and diverse communications network foundations in the world.
The Verizon Business global IP network has been ranked as the most-connected Internet backbone network, based on autonomous system connections, for 10 consecutive years (1999-2008), according to TeleGeography, a research division of PriMetrica Inc. As the global network expands into new growth regions and moves deeper into the countries where services are already offered today, global enterprise customers will continue to benefit from unsurpassed capacity, security, reliability and speed.
Strategic global network plans for 2009 include expansions of Private IP/multiprotocol label switching (MPLS), converged packet architecture, submarine cable systems and optical global mesh architecture.
Private IP/MPLS Deployment
Responding to the growing demand for IP solutions, Verizon Business is expanding its MPLS network with new and diverse nodes in South Asia, North Asia, Singapore, Japan, Mexico, the United States, Europe and the Middle East. The MPLS network also provides the foundation for multinational customers to optimize the cost and effectiveness of operating business processes among multiple locations. Currently, Verizon Business supports Private IP services in more than 120 countries around the world, including two of the fastest-growing countries – China and India.
Converged Packet Architecture
Expanding its converged packet architecture (CPA) network to 87 markets in 27 countries in 2008, Verizon Business will continue to add more CPA sites this year. CPA enables convergence of services onto a single packet access connection via a simple Ethernet interface. This gives customers the ability to move seamlessly from legacy time-division multiplexing (TDM) to packet-based technology, resulting in improved efficiency. New CPA locations this year include: Japan (Tokyo and Osaka); Taiwan (Taipei); South Korea (Seoul); Hong Kong; Singapore; Australia (Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide, Brisbane and Canberra); and India (Mumbai, Chennai, Bangalore, New Delhi and Hyderabad).
Submarine Cable Leadership
With participation in more than 80 submarine cables in the world, Verizon Business continues strategic investments in submarine cable capacity. The on-time completion in 2008 of the first phase of the 17,000-kilometer (10,500-mile) Trans-Pacific Express cable network from the U.S. to mainland China, South Korea and Taiwan paved the way for the second phase of the TPE cable, which is expected to land in Japan in early 2010. Verizon Business is the only U.S.-based company that is an original charter member of the Trans-Pacific Express Consortium.
Using those same cable leadership skills on the other side of the world, Verizon Business is a lead member of the Europe India Gateway (EIG) Consortium. The EIG is the first direct, high-bandwidth optical-fiber submarine cable system to be built connecting the United Kingdom, the Middle East and India.
Verizon Business will be one of the terminal parties for the more than $700 million EIG cable. The company will provide a cable terminal facility in Marseille, France, for the 15,000-kilometer (9,000 mile) cable. This will give the EIG direct connectivity to the Verizon Business network in Europe, as well as provide significant redundancy in cable stations and routing.
Verizon Business expects to have its terminal ready for the installation of EIG equipment in the third quarter 2009. When the EIG system is ready for service in 2010, it will provide additional capacity and diversity to the Middle East and India.
Optical Global Mesh Expansion
As the industry leader implementing seven-way mesh technology on its Atlantic and Pacific submarine cable routes, Verizon Business will expand its global mesh network to India and Egypt. The company also will continue optical-mesh architecture expansion in the U.S. and Canada. The mesh-network architecture utilizes additional paths for rerouting traffic in the event of a cable cut or other network disruption. The Verizon Business mesh network achieves industry-leading rates of availability exceeding 99.999 percent, given the high number of diverse links and network nodes.
Other Major Network Projects
- Additional major network projects scheduled for 2009 include:
- Second phase of the India network expansion.
- Expansion of the ultra-long-haul (ULH) network in the U.S. and Europe.
- Deployment of ROADM (reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexer) technology used to remotely configure wavelengths on the network, allowing for faster provisioning and trouble isolation.
- Implementation of packet-optical transport platform (P-OTP) network design.
- Deployment of 40 gigabits per second technology on additional selected network routes for the private IP and public IP networks.
- Continued testing of 100Gbps capabilities in an effort to move the industry toward production-quality 100Gbps in 2010.
- Expansion of new data centers in the United Kingdom and Hong Kong, and additional capacity at numerous other data centers.
About Verizon Business
Verizon Business, a unit of Verizon Communications (NYSE: VZ), is a global leader in communications and IT solutions. We combine professional expertise with the world’s most connected IP network to deliver award-winning communications, IT, information security and network solutions. We securely connect today’s extended enterprises of widespread and mobile customers, partners, suppliers and employees – enabling them to increase productivity and efficiency and help preserve the environment. Many of the world’s largest businesses and governments – including 96 percent of the Fortune 1000 and thousands of government agencies and educational institutions – rely on our professional and managed services and network technologies to accelerate their business. Find out more at www.verizonbusiness.com.
