NorthernNet
15/06/2009
HIGH SPEED DATA TRANSFER, INNOVATION & COLLABORATION FOR THE DIGITAL MEDIA SECTOR
The Northern Way was launched in 2004 by a coalition of partners across the North, in response to a challenge from John Prescott and Gordon Brown to establish the North of England as an area of exceptional opportunity combining a world-class economy with a superb quality of life, and to close the prosperity gap between the northern regions and the UK average.
A unique collaboration
The Northern Way is a unique initiative, bringing together the cities and regions of the North of England to work together to improve the sustainable economic development of the North towards the level of more prosperous regions.
Formed as a partnership between the three northern Regional Development Agencies (Yorkshire Forward, Northwest Regional Development Agency and One NorthEast), they also work with local authorities, universities, the private sector and other partners to secure a strong coalition in support of this goal.
Data Transfer, Innovation & Collaboration
The aim is to influence policy and delivery at a local, city region, regional and national level, to join up thinking and encourage collaboration.
NorthernNET is a direct manifestation of the focused efforts to nurture convergence of technology, content and distribution in the Digital and Creative industries across the north of England.
NorthernNET facilitates the combination of creative talent with technological expertise to create new opportunities for growth and innovation.
NorthernNET connects organisations and businesses from the Digital and Creative Industries with a high-performance, reliable, symmetric network . Members will share information and work together quickly, efficiently and in innovative ways. NorthernNET aims to link content creators, content deliverers and content users or commissioners across the North of England.
To facilitate the use of the NorthernNET sites across the North have been provided with equipment for media data to be converted, edited, stored and transferred across the network. These ‘Access Bureaus’ will be open to the public, and will attempt to cater for the varying needs of the industry.
In 2006, NorthernWay commissioned Adit North to undertake a Feasibility Study for their aspirations. This consultancy confirmed that the network was achievable and would facilitate collaboration across the media sector.
In 2007, Northern Way engaged the services of Adit North to procure the network, procure and install equipment at all Media Access Bureaus and to create a Special Purpose Vehicle (SPV) to manage the network.
After careful consideration of possible model options, Adit North recommended a fully managed, flexible and future proofed network solution based on the latest MPLS technology (MultiProtocol Label Switching).
There are several reasons why this was recommended:-
• The proposed NorthernNET sites were distributed over a wide geographical area, as opposed to a dense location where fibre deployment costs would be low.
• MPLS is a simple connectivity design where all sites (hubs and satellites) connect directly to the supplier’s core point of presence. There is no need for satellites to connect to hubs in order to become part of the network. This solution provides maximum flexibility and resilience.
• This technology would allow the network provider to deliver state of the art interconnectivity, maximum flexibility and the possibility of add on services for future phases.
• A managed solution would provide NorthernNET with a minimum residual management overhead
• Connectivity options and costs are easier to understand and manage.
A central Internet gateway (currently 40Mb) allows all customers on the network to have an intelligent connection to other Media companies across the UK for secure communication and collaboration.
A single provider of media equipment was engaged after full procurement process and intelligence gathering on ‘state of the art’ technology to ingest, edit, store and transfer data.