R&E Partners Awarded BTOP Grant

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

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From: "National LambdaRail" <National_LambdaRail () mail vresp com>
Date: July 2, 2010 2:45:22 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net
Subject: R&E Partners Awarded BTOP Grant
Reply-To: "National LambdaRail" <reply-162d071057-bf5036e1d7-8d4c () u cts vresp com>

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National LambdaRail, Partners Awarded $62 Million BTOP Grant to Interconnect Community Anchors with Advanced Broadband

Research and Education to Benefit from 100 Gbps Upgrade to NLR Backbone, Additional Fiber Routes  

 
Cypress, CA, July 2, 2010 - Today the National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) awarded $62 
million in federal stimulus funding to National LambdaRail (NLR), Internet2, the Northern Tier Network Consortium and 
the Indiana University Global Research Network Operations Center (GRNOC) to interconnect schools, libraries, healthcare 
providers, public safety agencies and other "community anchors" across the country with advanced broadband.

"National LambdaRail and our members and partners in the research and education networking community already have 15 
years collective experience serving community anchors, as well as an extensive, advanced network footprint and 
expertise managing next-generation broadband applications like telepresence," said Glenn Ricart, president and CEO, 
National LambdaRail. "U.S. UCAN is an historic opportunity for the research and education community to work together 
and to extend broadband capabilities beyond the 66,000 anchors we are already serving, to all interested anchor 
organizations coast to coast."

Cisco also made a significant contribution to the success of the proposal and will be providing state of the art 
networking equipment and other assistance to help ensure leading-edge capabilities are in place to support the most 
advanced needs of the community anchors.

The grant, awarded under the Broadband Technology Opportunities Program (BTOP), will enable NLR to upgrade its 
infrastructure with a new, 100Gbps backbone to serve research and education (R&E) as well as the broader anchor 
community. In addition, all routers on NLR’s Layer 3, PacketNet network will be upgraded, reducing the costs of 
connecting to NLR’s network as well as doubling the number of places where NLR can connect to its members and 
customers. Access to additional fiber optic routes will enable greater participation by the R&E community and other 
community anchors in NLR services; the routes will also provide additional alternate routes to help minimize downtime. 
For example, a new Dallas to Nashville route will provide in-land fiber optic connectivity in the South that is not as 
prone to possible hurricane damage. New fiber optic paths in the Northeast will give NLR greater capacity to serve 
institutions in that part of the country.

To extend the reach of R&E networks to all approximately 200,000 community anchors in the country while ensuring that 
R&E governance remains focused on R&E, NLR and its partners will be forming a non-profit organization, the U.S. Unified 
Community Anchor Network (U.S. UCAN), to provide the coordination needed, in collaboration with community anchor 
organizations, to serve the expanded set of anchor institutions. NLR’s member regional optical networks (RONs) will 
continue to play the role they have so successfully in the past, as the local connectors, under U.S. UCAN.

With regard to timeframe, the NTIA requires infrastructure projects to be substantially completed in the first two 
years of funding (2nd half 2010 through 1st half of 2012), with some work allowed in to the third year.  With NTIA 
funding being awarded in July, 2010, major elements of the upgrade could be online by late 2010, with completion of 
final components in 2013. 

More information on U.S. UCAN can be found at www.usucan.org

Questions specific to NLR may be sent to info () nlr net

U.S. UCAN release:  http://www.nlr.net/release.php?id=62

 
Contact NLR
We welcome your questions and feedback. Contact us at editor () nlr net.

To learn more about National LambdaRail, visit www.nlr.net.

 
National LambdaRail (NLR)
P.O. Box 1610, Cypress, CA 90630

www.nlr.net


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