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RNP and CPqD start Giga Project in 2003

An important applied research project for the creation of an experimental network of telecommunications and IP protocol convergence, planned since 2001, is already underway. On December 13, Giga Project's sponsoring agreement was signed with Finep (Financiadora de Estudos e Projetos), and the first resource transference was made in the beginning of January. R$ 55 million should be invested in a period of 3 years for the installation of a support infrastructure to optical communication projects, Internet protocols, services and applications.

The executive coordination of the project is a joint effort of the National Education and Research Network (RNP), responsible for the operation of the national academic Internet network, and the Center of Telecommunications Research and Development (CPqD), the greatest telecommunications research and development center in Latin America. The two institutions are in charge of assembling and operating the network. This network will be implanted in the southeast of Brazil, between the cities of Campinas, São Paulo, São José dos Campos, Cachoeira Paulista and the metropolitan region of Rio de Janeiro. In these places, there are important Research and Development (R&D) centers and telecommunications companies that will participate in the subprojects of technological development.

The R&D activities in Giga Project, which will use more than half of the predicted resources, will be carried out by consortia of research institutions and enterprises, through the hiring of subprojects in four thematic areas: optical networks, protocols and network services, telecommunications experimental services, and scientific services and applications. The hired subprojects shall result in prototypes, or methodologies, which will be used by the industrial sector for the improvement of equipment and services. This way, Giga Project will be transforming technology into economic value for Brazilian enterprises.

The implantation of the network to support the platform of Internet and optics tests should start in January 2003 and be over in 2004. The IP network to be assembled over this infrastructure of optical transmission will be initially based on Gigabit Ethernet (GE) technology, with transmission rates of 1 Gbps, being able to reach up to 10 Gbps. Telecommunications operators such as Telefonica, Telemar, Pegasus, Intelig and Eletronet will help assemble the network, by giving optical fibers, permitting the interconnection of the several points in the network.

The great advantage of Giga experimental network is the fact that it laps the IP (Internet Protocol) network directly over the WDM optical network (wavelength division multiplexing), not needing the SDH and ATM technologies and providing greater flexibility, lower costs and greater scalability. The great challenge of the project will be the construction of network architecture incorporating the functions of protection, quality of service and network management. This high-speed platform shall hold services and applications demanding greater traffic capacity, flexibility, real-time transmission quality, and service diversification, besides offering a lower cost to the final user.

Giga Project was originally induced by the Ministry of Science and Technology (MCT) as a "structuring" project. In June 2002, it was preliminarily submitted for sponsoring by the Steering Committee of the Fund for Technological Development of Telecommunications (Funttel) from the Ministry of Communications. The project was approved by Funttel in November after the proposal was detailed. The transference of resources, confirmed on December 13, will be made by Finep.

Action is being taken so that this project can be reproduced in the northeast of Brazil, including at least the cities of Recife, Campina Grande and Fortaleza, where high performance metropolitan networks were implanted in the late 90s, as a result of a public bid published by RNP.

[RNP, 01.14.2003]