LightRiver Software buys Unique Computer Services for management of multi-vendor transport networks

LightRiver Software, Inc., along with its sister company, LightRiver Technologies, Inc., say they have acquired Unique Computer Services, Inc., which provides multi- vendor transport network systems software. The LightRiver companies believe the new assets will make them a one-stop shop for design, delivery, and management of complex software-controlled transport networks. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

Unique offers the netFLEX software platform, which enables operators to provision and manage network elements from a variety of systems vendors, including FCAPS support. The netFLEX system provides a Layer 0/1/2 Transport Network Controller, either on premises or in a hosted cloud model, for multi-vendor management across such technology domains as WDM, Optical Transport Network (OTN), SONET, TDM, and Ethernet. It can operate with network elements from such vendors as ADVA Optical Networking, Nokia (formerly Alcatel-Lucent), Ciena, Cisco, Coriant, Fujitsu, Infinera, and others. LightRiver says netFLEX can act as a single platform for transport domain management and services provisioning as well as software-defined networking (SDN) multi-domain service orchestration enablement.

The addition of the netFLEX capabilities will enable the LightRiver companies to combine platforms from multiple vendors into a single, integrated, hardware/software ecosystem, they believe. For operators, the result will be improved return on investment through better speed of delivery, improved network operations, and avoidance of vendor lock in. For the transport systems vendors with whom the LightRiver companies work, the combination will enable nearer-term packet optical migration and SDN instantiation, with access to domain management friendly to legacy network elements, with open interfaces and programmable API's for the future, they say.

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