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NEC Collaborates with Stanford University, Georgia Tech and Raytheon BBN Technologies to Realize the Benefits of OpenFlow Technology

Attendees at the GEC9 in Washington, D.C. November 2-4 will be able to view live demonstrations of the revolutionary ProgrammableFlow switches connecting multiple institutions. Investigators Brighten Godfrey and Ashish Vulimiri of the University of Illinois, will show in the GENI Pathlet demonstration how edge devices can effectively use multipath routing between the campuses of Stanford, Georgia Tech, and Raytheon BBN Technologies. Professors Nick Feamster and Russ Clark at Georgia Tech will demonstrate a next-generation network access control that is built on top of NEC's ProgrammableFlow switches and is deployed across three buildings across the campus.

Also at GEC9, NEC will be demonstrating an early version of their breakthrough OpenFlow controller Helios, designed to maximize the benefits of OpenFlow and significantly increase the control and visibility of flow-based routing.

OpenFlow allows network applications and controllers running on external servers to define packet handing within each switching element in a network, allowing faculty and students from participating campuses to conduct experimentation and research on production networks. The ProgrammableFlow switches have been deployed in over 20 research organizations worldwide such as Stanford, Raytheon BBN, and Georgia Tech. Stanford has installed the switches in the Gates building to support both production and research traffic concurrently. Georgia Tech has deployed the switches in the Klaus Advanced Computing Building, as well as two other buildings on campus and is forwarding operational traffic over this deployment.

"We have worked closely with NEC among others to jointly develop the OpenFlow platform for innovation," reports Guru Parulkar, Executive Director of Clean Slate and Consulting Professor to the Stanford School of Engineering. "They have been a great partner-easy to work with, and displaying a good understanding of the issues."

Donald Clark, General Manager for NEC Corporation of America, elaborates with, "The OpenFlow movement represents the next significant innovation in networking leading to advances in higher learning and in business. Our deployment at Stanford, Georgia Tech, and beyond to other campuses has allowed us to learn a great deal as we prepare for the commercial launch of OpenFlow enabled network platforms."

OpenFlow is an open standard that enables a new generation of network control software. The OpenFlow Switch specification version 0.8.9 was created in 2008 by the OpenFlow Consortium, and its version 1.0 was created in 2009 to evangelize and support OpenFlow. Although hosted at Stanford University, it is their goal for OpenFlow to be owned by the community - for the betterment of research and innovation in networking.

About NEC Corporation

NEC Corporation is a leader in the integration of IT and network technologies that benefit businesses and people around the world. By providing a combination of products and solutions that cross utilize the company's experience and global resources, NEC's advanced technologies meet the complex and ever-changing needs of its customers. NEC brings more than 100 years of expertise in technological innovation to empower people, businesses and society. For more information, visit NEC at http://www.nec.com.

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