GlobeNet Gives Carrier Ethernet a Tropical Flair

CEN Feature (Dec 20 2011) Wholesale , Wholesale / Exchange

1. 

   Perhaps the word “tropicalize” makes you think of designing a house with a lot of outdoor spaces or giving away all the wool blazers in your wardrobe. But Erick Contag, chief operations officer for GlobeNet, uses the term to describe how his company adapted Carrier Ethernet services for the Latin American market.

   “We waited until U.S. early adopters became mainstream,” said Contag. “We knew we had a product we could offer in Latin America, but that it would be two to three years behind. We wanted to bring the latest technology from the U.S. and tropicalize it.”

   GlobeNet operates an undersea network between the U.S. and Latin America and offers connectivity to multiple Latin American markets. The company focuses solely on wholesaling services to other carriers and although Contag declined to detail what percentage of the company’s revenues come from Carrier Ethernet, he noted that its two fastest growing offerings are Carrier Ethernet and wavelength services.

   GlobeNet’s initial Carrier Ethernet offering was based on Ethernet over SDH — an option the company chose because “we wanted the utmost service quality and to make sure Ethernet really was a good substitute for traditional private lines”, Contag said. The offering, which GlobeNet calls EPL Dedicated is still popular with customers who “just want a simple way to upgrade their network and for whom quality is the most important thing,” said Contag.

   For customers that are more pricing sensitive, GlobeNet later added two Ethernet virtual private line offerings — EVPL Advantage, which offers guaranteed bandwidth, and EVPL Standard, which is based on shared bandwidth. These offerings are popular with customers that are buying connectivity from multiple network operators for route diversity and want “a relatively good product at a lower price,” Contag explained.

   GlobeNet’s Carrier Ethernet offerings are aimed at addressing the needs of two primary types of wholesale customers. One group includes Latin America-based Internet service providers that previously relied on traditional private lines to reach Internet points of presence in the U.S. The other group is international carriers looking to provide connectivity to Latin America. For them, Contag explained, “to some extent GlobeNet is the glue between two networks.”

   GlobeNet doesn’t operate its own networks within individual markets.  But the company has established partnerships with operators that do offer that type of connectivity — and those operators are required to meet exacting standards. “We’re very selective,” said Contag. “Sometimes less is more.”

   Once a service provider customer begins using GlobeNet’s Carrier Ethernet service, they often come back for more and bigger circuits, Contag said. “The minute they get a flavor for it, they don’t want to do anything but Carrier Ethernet,” he said.

   Customers are pleased with how quickly and easily upgrades can be made using Carrier Ethernet, Contag said. He cited the example of a company that purchased two VLANs — one at 2 Mb/s and one at 20 Mb/s — delivered inside a 100 Mb/s interface.

   “They wanted to double their capacity and asked ‘How long will it take?’” Contag recalled.

   The customer was used to waiting for 30 to 90 days to upgrade SDH circuits. But in this case, Contag said, “Three days later they had the upgrade — and it only took three days because of the paperwork.”

   GlobeNet customers like the fact that they don’t have to invest in legacy technologies and don’t need sophisticated telecom equipment. They are pleased that “we provide an Ethernet pipe straight into their router,” Contag said.

   GlobeNet was one of the first network operators to offer Carrier Ethernet in Latin America, and Contag said being a pioneer helped the company gained a market edge, as well as valuable real world experience that customers appreciate.

   “It’s a combination of a good product portfolio, the highest quality of service and the right partners to extend service to other locations,” said Contag.

    

   Bookmark or Share this article

Login to comment.