According to a new report issued by Yankee Group, 50 percent of all Internet traffic in Europe now travels over optical Internet equipment from Nortel Networks.
“The massive Internet growth we are seeing in Europe — estimated at 200
million users by 2005 — is only possible with the optical backbone networks
to support it,” said Chris Lewis, managing director, research and consulting
at the Yankee Group in Europe.
According to the Yankee Group, in the The Optical Internet in Europe: Ending
the Bottleneck, availability of pan-European bandwidth is
beginning to highlight the lack of capacity in national and access networks.
This growing local bottleneck inhibits growth and is prompting several
pan-European bandwidth providers to build national and city fiber networks.
“This report confirms Nortel Networks’ substantial impact on Europe’s
Internet backbone,” said Matt Desch, president, Service Provider Solutions,
Nortel Networks (NT).
Desch added that with the Metromedia Fiber Network agreement, Nortel
Networks is supplying more than 75 percent of all pan-European optical
networks.
Nortels multi-million dollar deal with Metromedia Fiber Network (MFNX) for
equipment to connect major cities throughout Europe follows a $250 million
contract announced in February for deployment of Nortel Networks’ Optical
Internet solutions in North America.
“We remain uniquely positioned to support Yankee Group’s continued
expectations for growth,” Desch said. “Our operations are structured to keep
us ahead of the self-perpetuating demand cycle by doubling capacity and
halving bandwidth costs every nine months.”