Pica8 achieves SDN Blue Orbit

Pica8 Inc., which has developed an open, programmable switching system, has signed on to participate in the Blue Orbit software-defined network (SDN) ecosystem Cyan (NYSE: CYNI) has created, the two companies say.

Packet-optical transport systems vendor Cyan launched the OpenFlow-based Blue Orbit earlier this year to bring together partners who shared an interest in creating an ecosystem for the development and demonstration of SDN and network functions virtualization (NFV) products and applications, including Cyan’s own Blue Planet SDN platform (see “Cyan targets Blue Orbit multivendor ecosystem at SDN” and “Cyan adds Planet Inventory to Blue Planet SDN applications”).

According to Pica8 Vice President of Marketing Steve Garrison, the ecosystem will provide his company with a stage to highlight the features of its PicOS operating system, which is designed to enable the deployment of “white box” switches in an SDN environment. In particular, participation in Blue Orbit will enable Pica8 to not only demonstrate its capabilities to potential customers, but show its interoperability with other SDN-based applications and systems, Garrison said.

PicOS aids content delivery from one data center to another, which makes it a natural fit for the Blue Orbit ecosystem, which combines SDN and NFV applications with optical networking connectivity, Garrison and Cyan CMO Joe Cumello told Lightwave. PicOS is currently available, Garrison said.

Cumello says that Blue Orbit is proving very useful in its current customer engagements, which include several Tier 1 service providers that he did not identify.

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