1. Journey from Service Provider to Infrastructure Player
UKNOF43 April 19
Richard Shaw

2. About me
Richard Shaw
Lead Engineer – Network Operations

3. Our journey so far
1995
Zen Founded by Richard Tang
1998
Comdex Best Internet Provider
2000
First Broadband Customer
2002
10,000 customers
2010
Launched Fibre Broadband
2013
Which? Recommended
2014
First 100 LLU exchanges
2015
Next 100 LLU exchanges (200)
2017
Huawei + Juniper/Ericsson network
2018
200 more exchanges for 400 in total
2019
+100 exchanges
2020+
You are just about to find out!

4. Our infrastructure build approach so far
400 live
50 live Q2
Based on existing customers and prospect data
Skewed to residential and small business
400 exchanges that gives us ~55% FTTx coverage
Another 50 being unbundled which gets us to >65% coverage
Of those 400, 275 have EAD based services live

5. Some interesting side effects
<1Gbps >1Gbps >10Gbps
Most of Manchester & surrounding areas are very well covered
Very few exchanges in Birmingham

6. Our current network architecture
Openreach Exchange
Core Site 1
GEA
EAD
Juniper EX2200
ADVA GE114
L2 Backhaul
EG-X or NE20
Core Site 2
Service Termination
‘Flat’ L2 between Exchange and Core
Multi-vendor Core/Agg/BNG/LNS makes life a bit ‘interesting’
Two main core sites – London and Manchester
Our current issues:
Scaling is difficult
Mixing traffic types is very hard
Capacity has to be managed on always ensuring enough headroom (although that means everyone ‘never loses a packet’)
No ability to use multiple backhauls from exchange to balance traffic
Caching and other network functions have to happen in the core
All traffic either goes to London or Manchester, even if it’s destined for the ‘exchange next door’

7. Traffic Growth prediction for Zen
Usage increase plus the move to 1Gbps then 10Gbps tails as Openreach continues to drive EAD prices down
‘Triple Whammy’ effect of bearer speed, extra usage and more circuits
Copper decline plus influence of FTTP rollout

8. So something has to change…

9. Forward look of Infrastructure
More based on future demands and customers
Significant focus on our partners and wholesale customers’ needs rather than just our existing customers
Need for local off-load of popular content (YouTube/Netflix etc.) meaning flat L2 no longer cuts the grade
Triple whammy of more customers plus more bandwidth for those customers plus more coverage
Leads to…..
New architecture needed to manage traffic
Significant jump in core and aggregation bandwidth
Significant jump in edge, transit and BNG capacity

10. A 2025 capable infrastructure
High level principles
Carrier Grade Availability
Industry Alignment (TMForum eTOM/TOGAF & MPLS/E-VPN/E-LAN)
Interoperability
High/Total Automation
Extensible/Scalable design (no ‘horizontal scaling’ – it doesn’t work)
Secure by Design

11. 2021 2025 (maybe…) Our goals 700 exchanges giving 80%+ coverage
5Tbps core network
2Tbps of Peering and Transit
3Tbps of BNG capacity
2Tbps of Ethernet capacity
10 nx10Gbps metro rings
2025 (maybe…)
987 exchanges giving 100% coverage
25Tbps core network
10Tbps of Peering and Transit
15Tbps of BNG capacity
10Tbps of Ethernet capacity
50 nx100Gbps metro rings

12. Thank You