It used to take several weeks or even months to fully provision connectivity across an enterprise network, as each new circuit would have to be set up manually. Oftentimes, it would also require signing a long-term contract with a service provider.
Now the process is much more flexible and can be done almost instantaneously by working with a company like PacketFabric, which is a member of the NantWorks ecosystem of companies. Last week at the annual conference of the Pacific Telecommunications Council (PTC), PTC’17: “Changing Realities” in Honolulu, PacketFabric unveiled a next-generation Ethernet-based cloud networking platform that allows businesses to instantaneously provision massively scalable network connectivity between two or more points across its private backbone network. The platform runs on an any-to-any SDN-powered network, which currently enables coast-to-coast connectivity across 86 carrier-neutral colocation facilities in 11 U.S. markets.
What’s more, the PacketFabric platform is fully-automated and can be controlled programmatically. Using PacketFabric, customers can easily meet the capacity demands that come with bandwidth-intensive applications and workloads by instantly provisioning terabits of capacity to any other facility that is connected to the fabric. The platform was designed with the latest networking and optical technologies, which enable it to deliver massive capacity. PacketFabric delivers hundreds of terabits per second of network capacity, and will scale to petabits over time. Plus, this service can be used on a month-to-month or usage basis which eliminates the need to buy capacity circuits and sign long term contracts.
“This next-generation, scalable cloud networking fabric will enable disparate marketplaces such as our healthcare delivery system to communicate seamlessly and to enable secure transfer of data at gigabit to terabits per second speeds if so needed,” commented Dr. Patrick Soon-Shiong, Chairman and CEO of NantWorks. “In this era of big data and augmented intelligence in medicine, PacketFabric’s next-generation cloud infrastructure fulfills an infrastructure unmet need in the delivery of 21st century molecular medicine,”
Richard Steenbergen, Chief Technology Officer of PacketFabric, also commented on the platform.
“When we set out to create PacketFabric, our goal was to completely change the networking ecosystem, radically overhauling the way companies think about procuring and maintaining their networking services,” explained Steenbergen. “To do that, we knew we needed to combine technologies from different disciplines in a way that had never before been achieved, and deliver truly disruptive scale and performance, consistent with the vision at NantWorks. Our platform is uniquely designed to deliver on the requirements of next-generation networks, with a robust, custom-designed orchestration layer capable of provisioning tens of millions of virtual circuits. The platform includes a real-time telemetry system designed to collect and visualize network performance data and provide complete visibility and control. PacketFabric is built on optical and packet switching platforms capable of delivering hundreds of terabits per second.”
As PacketFabric Chief Executive Officer William Charnock pointed out, this platform will ultimately result in a smoother and simpler provisioning process.
“As seasoned networking professionals, our objective at PacketFabric is to ease networking pain points and simplify the process of managing a hyper-scalable network infrastructure for our customers,” shared Charnock. “Leveraging lessons learned from over 100 years of combined executive leadership experience building and operating some of the largest network and cloud infrastructure platforms in the world, we’ve developed a truly revolutionary approach designed to facilitate scalable and secure connectivity services that are significantly more cost-effective and flexible than traditional services.”
To learn more about PacketFabric, click here.