GÉANT Topology Evolution An update on the GN4-3N topology definition work Sebastiano Buscaglione, Network Architect Tallinn 18/06/2019

The GÉANT Network today Dark Fibre in central Europe Lease capacity to most countries Hub and Spoke Based on short procurement cycles Short term requirements Cost inefficiency Blue – Dark fibre Black– Lease capacity Orange - Spectrum

A long term investment Go beyond the state-of-the-art by restructuring the backbone network through exploration and procurement of long-term IRUs and associated equipment to increase the footprint, stimulating the market in cross-border communications infrastructure whilst decreasing the digital divide and reducing costs From EC objectives for IRU SGA

Infrastructure investment to cover as many countries as possible Our approach - drivers Bandwidth cost to be the same at every location Bandwidth cost to be marginal Infrastructure investment to cover as many countries as possible Cost share reduction Lowest latency between every pair of locations Resiliency Presence in strategic location and synergies with future opportunities Minimise infrastructure duplication within R&E community

The 2018 Reference topology Fibre/spectrum to more NRENs Increase of meshing Tiering Dual PoPs on larger countries Better connectivity PoPs in strategic locations Cost efficiency!

Mar 2019 – Providers Webinar Apr 2019 - 2nd RFI New market engagement Oct 2018 - Capacity Europe 2018 Mar 2019 – Providers Webinar Apr 2019 - 2nd RFI 51 suppliers and a number of NRENs 460 quotes 215 DF 54 Spectrum (Increasing) 191 Lease Mar –> May 2019 – F2F meetings with providers, 33 meetings, ~135h May 2019 - Re-modelling

The 2019 Reference topology Increase of Spectrum use 17 Providers spectrum offers in 2019 vs 3 in 2018 Optimisation of connectivity Infrastructure to more countries (Albania) More meshing Increased cost efficiency!

The new topology in numbers Costs comparison  K of EUR 2018 Budget 2018 Reference 2019 Reference Difference 2018 -> 2019 One off   € 48,700 € 40,000 -€ 8,700 OPEX € 6,500 € 4,200 -€ 0 Cost share OPEX € 3,200 € 2,200 € 2,100 -€ 100 Cost share CAPEX € 400 € 0 -€ 400 Includes costs for items directly involved with infrastructure costs. Specifically: DWDM equipment, connectivity and deployment costs. Numbers rounded to 100K EUR. Infrastructure type Infrastructure length Topology Number of links Fibre Spectrum Reference 2018 47 33 14 Reference 2019 46 27 19 Topology Type Km 2018 DF 17,800  Reference Spectrum 11,800   Total 29,600 2019 16,650 10,460 27,110

How is cost reduction achieved? Cost per meter of Fibre 2019 reference

More opportunities to improve further Ireland Israel and Cyprus SEE Malta Turkey Northern Macedonia Montenegro Luxemburg

Phase A procurement to start in Q3/Q4 2019 Phasing 1 2 3 4 5 6 Phase A procurement to start in Q3/Q4 2019

GEANT OLS procurement Guy Roberts 18th June 2019

History Current network is built on Infinera DTN-X GÉANT ran Voyager field trial in 2017 and decided to take a risk on adding DCI overlay to DTN-X Significant costs savings convinced us of benefit of OLS We purchased the Infinera Groove equipment last year We have committed to Open Line System (OLS) in new network

The transmission layer – DCI deployment 2018/2019 2x 8QAM (300Gbps) IP trunk on western ring is carried using Groove Eastern part of network now being upgraded 1414

New GÉANT network Spectrum sharing is key to making the new network economic We will use spectrum from commercial providers and NRENs We also plan to offer spectrum as a service to our customers Coordination with NRENs will be achieved via the Spectrum sharing task in GEANT WP7

Optical equipment evolution Flexgrid allows spectrum to be allocated flexibly on a per-service basis Modulation schemes allow spectrum to be fully utilized Digital Signal Processing (DSP) and Large Scale Integration (LSI) allow optical impairments caused by fibre to be easily removed Together these technologies means that modern systems can operate right up to the Shannon limit * 128QAM Ciena, Roberts et. Al. April 2017

Open Line System framework GÉANT will put in place framework agreements with up to 6 vendors:   NREN/GÉANT can purchase from any frameworks The frameworks will include a pricing catalogue In recent years purchasing from frameworks by NREN has been increasing Vendors can later add discounts and new features to frameworks Framework sets out clear criteria for ‘catalogue ordering procedures’ as well as ‘further competition’. GÉANT will run a competitive dialogue process to select a vendor from the framework to build our network.

OTE – Procurement Timeline Launch Tender Selection of Bidders Invitation to Participate in Dialogue Receive ITSOP responses Best and Final Offer Award and contract implementation Stage One – Phase 1- Bidders invited to respond to the Supplier Questionnaire (SQ) and Mandatory Technical and Commercial (pricing catalogue) Requirements document (MTCR), including a “locked” Simple Reference Design for costing purposes (SRD) Stage 1 Stage One – Phase 2- Bidders passing through the SQ and MTCR document phase are sent the key to the SRD document. Bidders price up the SRD using their pricing catalogue submitted previously. The top 6 highest scoring bidders (per OEM solution) for the SRD are taken through to the next stage where bidder numbers exceed 6 Stage Two - the top 6 Bidders are now sent: the draft Invitation to Submit Outline Proposals the draft full reference design the draft framework agreement including all schedules (call off contract and SLA, etc) Receive and review draft technical and commercial responses including financial model Draft agenda for dialogue specific to each Bidder Arrange and hold dialogue meetings OTE – Procurement Timeline Stage 3 - Invitation to Submit Final Bids Final requirements drafted and sent to all bidders, including final versions of contracts Full formal Evaluation of received offers Stage 2 Framework Agreement providers awarded Highest scoring bidder for the GÉANT topology awarded first call off contract 2019 April May June July Sept October Dec Jan 2020

Status & next steps Done: MTCR and responses received from seven vendors Pricing received from seven vendors Compliance and sort-listing is ongoing Next: ITSOP will be issued by the end of the month that describes the detailed requirements of the GÉANT network Evaluation team to review the responses Dialogue likely to be September Final bids will be requested once dialogue is complete

sebastiano.buscaglione@geant.org guy.roberts@geant.org