 "Hurricane Electric Implements IPv6 Enabled Brocade Network")
Brocade has announced that Hurricane Electric, an Internet backbone and co-location provider, has future-readied its business to support massive bandwidth demands and device growth by implementing Brocade Internet Protocol version 6 (IPv6) switches and routers into its geographically distributed network.
Hurricane Electric provides its customers dedicated servers, direct Internet connections, and Web hosting services. They deployed the Brocade NetIron XMR Internet core router and Brocade MLXe core routers to future-proof its global network and multiple datacentres, including its 200,000 square foot co-location facility in Fremont, Calif.
“IPv6 should be the single most important thing on network operators’ minds today. If they are relying on the global Internet, then they need to understand why IPv6 is critical,” said Martin Levy, Director-IPv6 strategy, Hurricane Electric. “With an infrastructure of our magnitude, we absolutely required a simply, yet powerful and scalable routing infrastructure to support massive routing table space, IPv6, 10 GbE and a base to support for 100GbE in the future. We rely on Brocade to provide us the right balance of performance, future IPv6 routing table scalability and total cost of ownership to ensure a solid network investment.”
To help monitor this expansive network end-to-end, Brocade has embedded sFlow technology into network router and switch ASICs to deliver an “always-on” technology that operates at wire speed performance. Cost of implementation is driven down dramatically when compared to traditional network monitoring solutions using mirrored ports, probes, and line tap technologies.
“Measurement is also critical,” continued Levy. “We rely on the sFlow platform embedded in our Brocade NetIron XMR Internet routers and Brocade MLXe core routers in order to understand in real-time where our traffic is flowing. This allows us to optimise our infrastructure, save money and more importantly, we know that our massive network is operating in a reliable and efficient manner.”
“Advanced network infrastructures have become complex extensions of business operations that must adapt to rapid growth, data intensive applications, security threats, and new technologies that can stress the entire network,” said Ken Cheng, vice president, Service Provider Products for Brocade. “To address these issues, Brocade will continue to innovate in IPv6 to create one of the industry’s most complete set of IPv6 unicast, multicast, and transition protocols. Brocade has a strong roadmap to support both enterprise and service provider IPv6 dual-stack environments, and we continue to be a leading player in helping governments and organisations worldwide in their transition to IPv6.”