High-Speed Network Soon For Universities

Indian universities are soon going to be linked with a high speed internet connection, which has a capacity of more than 1,000 times that currently available at premier institutes like Indian Institute of Technology Delhi. The network called IU Net, which will be implemented in 9 months, is expected to have the highest capacity in the world after the US.

IU Net will have a band width of about 2.5 gbps (giga bytes per second) and will be scalable upto 10 gbps. Compare this with the current bandwidth of 2 mbps (mega bytes per second) available at premier institutions like IIT Delhi and Indian Institute of Science , Bangalore.

 

The infrastructure for this connectivity is being put up by a joint venture company which will be formed by two consortiums IU Net India and IU Net USA. The equity pattern of this joint venture is yet to be decided. This venture will probably be the first national backbone funded with private equity.

IU Net India consists of DoT, IIT Delhi, IIT Mumbai, IIT Chennai, Indian Institute of Information Technology Hyderabad and Indian Institute of Science Bangalore. IU Net USA's share holders are Carnegie Mellon University and a telecom company.

The project is expected to be completed in nine months. Prof VS Arunachalam, former scientific advisor to the Indian Defence minister and Prof. Raj Reddy who is currently on several IT advisory committees to President Clinton in the US, were here from Carnegie Mellon to discuss the project. They met with the Andhra Pradesh Chief minister Nara Chandra Babu Naidu, The IT Task force, Deputy chairman of the planning commission Jaswant Singh, minister of communications Sushma Swaraj and representatives from the Maharshtra Government. Arunachalam reportedly said that if India implements this network, it will have the highest band-width in the world, after the US, which is working towards a 100 gbps network.

The total cost of the project is expected to be about US $ 35 million. One source says that 85 per cent of this which will be equipment cost is going to be funded by Carnegie Mellon University. DoT is going to dedicate two fibre optic lines as the back bone for this project. But it is not too clear if these lines are going to be owned by the joint venture company or leased by DoT.

The network, however, is going to be commercially sustainable from the revenues that will be generated. It will initially cover eight to 10 major cities and will also connect some commercial organisations which want high band width connectivity.