Asia’s first 100Gbps international research and education link

NICT, Singapore Advanced Research and Education Network (SingAREN) and the National Supercomputing Centre Singapore (NSCC) have jointly established 100Gbps links to have enhanced the previous 10Gbps links. The 100Gbps links have already been in operation since November 1, 2017 as the backbone of Asia research and education networks (NRENs).

In current NRENs, following the flow of large-scale data sharing and utilization such as “Big Data” and “e-science” and international expansion of educational institutions, it is rapidly advancing the speed of international network and connectivity (establishing 100Gbps networks) especially between the US and Europe. Though 100Gbps links are established linking Japan-US and Singapore-US, the links that have launched this time connect Tokyo-Hong Kong and Hong Kong-Singapore are the first international NREN 100Gbps links in the Asian region.

After the launch of these links and beginning of its operation, NICT co-organized “Launch of the First 100G International R&E Link in Asia” which celebrated the first 100Gbps international research and education link in Asia on December 1, 2017 at Shaw Foundation Alumni House, National University of Singapore with SingAREN. In the launch ceremony, a signing ceremony of a three-party Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between NICT, SignAREN and NSCC was held to uphold and reinforce the collaborative relationships.

This 100Gbps links together with the other current 100Gbps links have formed a ring in the Asia Pacific region. This ring is called Asia Pacific Ring (APR) and seven delegates from organizations involved with APR, three in Japan and four in the other regions, signed a seven-party MoU to promote collaborative researches and experiments. We expect that the MoU will represent the beginning of facilitation for setting up international experimental hi-speed networks which might now be time-consuming to establish and building a research infrastructure in which research and educational institutes including NICT can freely exchange information with the US and countries in ASIA.

In the ceremony, the result of the experiment “200+ Gbps data transfer across the Pacific Ocean” conducted using the APR at SC17, which was the International Conference for High Performance Computing, Networking, Storage and Analysis held in Denver, USA in November, was reported.

In near future, it is predicted that international NRENs connectivity with 100Gbps network will be accelerated in the other Asian (domestic and international) sections and the sections between Asia and Europe. Thus, Tokyo-Hong Kong-Singapore 100Gbps links will be much more used, also as a part of APR, than ever and we believe that this will contribute to research and development in various fields in Japan at a global level.