News

Virgin Media Business targets data centres with 10Gbps

The corporate arm of Virgin Media is boosting its network to ‘carrier grade connectivity,’ aiming the network at data centre clients.

3 Feb 2011

Virgin Media Business has announced a push into the data centre with the launch of a new carrier grade' offering.

The company will now offer speeds of up to 10Gbps through its fibre optic network to data centres, with each interconnect capable of linking up to 8,000 users.

The service isn't aimed at all though, as Virgin Media Business is targeting selected companies in its first wave.

David Green, product manager at Virgin Media Business, told IT PRO: "We are initially focussing on data centres who would incorporate connectivity into the services they provide to their customers."

"These could be systems integrators managing a data centre on behalf of a complex multi-site organisation or a cloud service provider offering Software or Infrastructure as a Service (SAAS, IAAS) from their own data centres. That way they can benefit from capacity managed carrier class connectivity as well as cost savings."

The major benefits of this new approach, according to firm, would be a "dramatic reduction" in power consumed and space used in data centres, which in turn could lead to massive cost benefits.

"Power wise we will utilise wavelength-division multiplexing (WDM) technology to give the right level of connection," added Green.

"The provider we use is Transmode and its power and space footprint is incredibly good. For example, a fully loaded box that can support 40 10Gbps services only has 750 watts power usage."

This product is the latest in a line from Virgin Media Business, following its re-brand back in February 2010.

In September, it launched its "Big Red Internet" product to offer new broadband packages to business customers.