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

2. 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

3. 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

4. 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

5. 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!

6. Mar 2019 – Providers Webinar Apr 2019 - 2nd RFI
New market engagement
Oct Capacity Europe 2018
Mar 2019 – Providers Webinar
Apr nd 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 Re-modelling

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

8. The new topology in numbers
Costs comparison
 K of EUR
2018 Budget
2018 Reference
2019 Reference
Difference > 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

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

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

11. 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

12. GEANT OLS procurement
Guy Roberts
18th June 2019

13. 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

14. 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

15. 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

16. 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

17. 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.

18. 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

19. 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