Customer Success Story
Sunet expects 4-fold capacity increase using one-third the power
Universities, researchers, and cultural institutions in Sweden need fast, reliable, and secure connectivity to collaborate nationally and internationally. To support that collaboration, Sunet, the Swedish University Computer Network, delivers advanced networking and other digital services with white-glove service.
As its data volumes and service portfolio grew, Sunet wanted to expand network capacity in a way that would be operationally efficient and environmentally sustainable. Sunet has designed its second-generation converged optical network, built on Juniper PTX Series Routers with integrated coherent optics. Sunet anticipates a $100,000 savings in router-related power costs—with quadruple the capacity.
Overview
| Company | Sunet |
| Industry | Service Provider |
| Products used | PTX10001-36MR, JCO400 Coherent Optical Transceivers |
| Region | EMEA |
$100,000
Savings in power costs per year expected by moving to 400G with PTX10001 routers
4X
Expected capacity increase while reducing power consumption by two-thirds
750,000
Connected users at 110 universities, research institutions, and cultural institutions
8,500
Kilometers of fiber across Sweden
Connect universities and enable collaboration
“The network should never get in the way of research,” says Per Nihlén, CTO of Sunet. “We built an extremely resilient network in 2016 and the network has never been down.”
Sunet was forward-thinking back then, when it designed and built a converged IP and optical network to deliver the performance, resilience, and security that universities, researchers, and cultural institutions in Sweden needed then. The foundation was Juniper MX Series Universal Routers.
Fast forward to 2023. Data volumes have exploded. Application needs have expanded. Sunet offers digital exams; identity management; cloud-based file sharing, backup, and storage; conferencing; cybersecurity; and managed campus network services to its academic, museum, and other cultural institutions in Sweden.
Sunet was ready to migrate its national network to 400G.
400G converged optical network
Sunet chose Juniper PTX10001-36MR Packet Transport Routers with Juniper integrated coherent optics for its second-generation, 400G-capable network. Juniper’s converged optical routing architecture provides Sunet with an extensible, sustainable, and automated network that supports IP over DWDM today and in the future.
The innovative design supports adaptability to meet future needs.
“We will use the PTX10001 everywhere, which simplifies deployment, scaling, and maintenance,” says Nihlén. “We can add more 400G pluggable optics as we need. The PTX offers a pay-as-you-grow model.”
Sunet plans to use segment routing, a source-based routing technique that simplifies traffic engineering and management across network domains. Segment routing, which replaces RSVP-TE, can make the network more agile and flexible to meet quality-of-service levels for applications and services.
Adaptable, scalable network for the future
“The new network will be ready for anything researchers need,” says Nihlén. Beyond delivering 400GbE at scale to meet the needs of academic research and collaboration, the PTX10001 router provides power- and space-saving advantages that support Sunet’s sustainability goals. “We will quadruple the capacity but use less than one-third the power that we did with our first-generation converged network,” he says. “We are calculating nearly a $100,000 power savings for the routers alone.”
Sunet can be confident that research and other sensitive data will be safe from prying eyes. “Every router interface will be MACsec-encrypted to protect Swedish research,” he says. Sunet plans to migrate to the new PTX Series Routers in early 2024. Nihlén anticipates that the refresh of 90 sites will take just four months.
Nihlén shares a final thought: “People can build greener networks without drawbacks. Building a network that consumes less power is good for the environment.”
Sunet’s Updated Data Center to Deliver Four-fold Capacity Increase Using One-third the Power
Discover how Sunet, the network provider for all government-funded research and universities in Sweden, collaborated with Juniper to enhance network resilience and efficiency. CTO Per Nihlen shares insights into their latest project using the Juniper PTX10001 with pluggable coherent optics at 400G. This innovative solution not only quadrupled network capacity but also achieved significant cost savings by reducing power consumption.
The Products
PTX10001-36MR
The PTX10001-36MR is a high-capacity, space- and power-optimized routing and switching platform. It delivers 9.6 Tbps of throughput and 10.8 Tbps of I/O capacity in a 1 U, fixed form factor. Based on the Juniper Express 4 ASIC, the platform provides dense 100GbE and 400GbE connectivity for highly scalable routing and switching in cloud, service provider, and enterprise networks and data centers.
JCO400 Coherent Optical Transceivers
400G ZR/ZR+ coherent DWDM transceivers are essential to any metro network modernization strategy. Juniper’s JCO400 series delivers best-in-class performance and innovative software integrations to simplify the configuration and management of a converged packet-optical architecture.
Published September 2023