Business

Akara and LightWave Communications announce partnership and first customer for storage-over-SONET managed service offering

Oct. 21, 2002

October 21, 2002--Akara, a provider of storage-over-SONET extension solutions for carriers and enterprises, and LightWave Communications, a facilities-based carrier, announced a strategic partnership and the launch of LightWave's storage-over-SONET managed service offering. The two companies also announced the partnership's first customer deployment at Digex, a provider of managed Web and application hosting services.

Akara, a provider of storage-over-SONET extension solutions for carriers and enterprises, and LightWave Communications, a facilities-based carrier, announced a strategic partnership and the launch of LightWave's storage-over-SONET managed service offering. The two companies also announced the partnership's first customer deployment at Digex, a provider of managed Web and application hosting services.

LightWave is providing Digex with a managed service offering that maps native Gigabit Ethernet onto LightWave's SONET and transports the data between data centers in Virginia and Maryland using Akara's OUSP data center multiplexer. Akara's OUSP adapts Gigabit Ethernet traffic originating from Digex-owned routers onto a SONET OC-12 interface for transport through LightWave's existing SONET network.

Based on the OUSP's ability to support all data center protocols, Digex can use its existing Gigabit Ethernet interface, rather than purchase an expensive packet-over-SONET interface on the same device. LightWave manages the entire end-to-end circuit from their network operations center, providing quick trouble-shooting and fault isolation.

LightWave Communications is focused on increasing revenues and profitability by offering differentiated, storage-related services that fully leverage its investment in SONET infrastructure. With a specialized knowledge of storage data transport technologies, LightWave's strategic mandate is to provide enterprises with reliable and economic storage extension services over its SONET-based network.

Akara's OUSP multiplexes data center protocols such as Fibre Channel, ESCON, Gigabit Ethernet and FICON directly into flexible SONET payloads to extend enterprises' business continuance applications over existing SONET/SDH, dark fiber or DWDM networks. This customer-premise device is "enterprise-ready" with OC-3, OC-12 and OC-48 connectivity, enabling the majority of enterprises to easily connect their storage networks to carriers' ubiquitous SONET services for high-performance, cost-effective extended storage networking.

More information about LightWave Communications (Laurel, MD) can be found at www.lightwavecomm.net. For more information about Akara (Ottawa), visit the company website at www.akara.com.