Optical transport systems vendor ECI has made the first announcement of a customer for elements of its LightAPPS family of software defined networking (SDN) applications. Trafikverket, the Swedish administration in charge of the country's transport infrastructure, including the state road network and national railway, has opted to use ECI's LightINSIGHT and LightTIME SDN apps to help manage its communications network.
ECI unveiled the first elements of the LightAPPS portfolio earlier this year (see "ECI Telecom unveils first LightApps for transport SDN"). LightINSIGHT is a network analytics application that keeps track of network inventory, use trends, network health, and the status of new service penetration. It features a management dashboard to improve visibility of network resources and customer service level agreements (SLAs) by tracking key performance indicators, ECI says. LightTIME is a service scheduler that enables operators to reserve network resources in advance of a planned service roll out.
"Trafikverket had very clear goals in mind when selecting LightAPPS. In order to optimize our current network resources, we wanted a system that would increase efficiency, reduce resources, automate tasks, and simplify operations with an intuitive interface and management dashboard for increased visibility," according to Kristoffer Stromberg, Head of Network Development and Planning at Trafikverket.
"Today Trafikverket can pre-schedule additional bandwidth to broadcast a big game and know, with certainty that this extra bandwidth will be available when needed and then will automatically disconnect afterwards. Predefined templates simplify the process of new service activation, while reducing the chance of human errors," added Gali Malkiel, Head of ECI's Software Line of Business.
Other members of the LightAPPs family include:
- LightCONNECT, for bandwidth on demand
- LightACTION, for network programming
- LightSAVER, for power optimization
- LightWAYS, for traffic congestion management.
LightCONNECT, LightINSIGHT, and LightTIME are the only three members of the family currently shipping. LightACTION should be available in the fourth quarter of this year, according to ECI sources.
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