08
NEWS IN BRIEF
Benning Develops bespoke modular
power solution for Orbital
Benning UK has successfully completed a bespoke power protection solution for
Orbital’s remote monitoring and control equipment, IRIS, which has now been
installed in more than 70 sites across the UK.
With the requirement to be fully operational 24/7, IRIS is a market-leading
remote telemetry device (RTU), which enables users in the gas and related
industries to remotely monitor and control equipment from a centralised location.
Benning was selected as the power protection partner to develop a bespoke
and high availability back-up solution for IRIS; and was chosen due to its high
engineering standards and in-house capability for developing bespoke solutions
for industrial applications.
As a result, one of the most flexible, cost-effective and rugged power
protection solutions currently available has been realised, providing a competitive
‘functionality vs cost per unit’ ratio. Benning achieved this by developing a
modular solution, which removes single points of failure, allows users to simply add
modules in line with the required loads, and enables N+1 redundancy. This means
that in the unlikely event of a module failing and maintenance work needing to be
carried out, the system can stay online. In conjunction with the VRLA batteries, the
system can provide a backup time of up to 8 hours when a mains failure occurs.
In addition, Benning consciously used over-specified and oversized capacitors to
extend their operational life and overcome challenges, such as moisture ingress –
meeting all of Orbital’s requirements.
Following this successful collaboration, Orbital and Benning are currently
developing an integrated design for customers with space constraints. Orbital
UK’s Managing Director Richard Law commented on Orbital’s cooperation with
Benning, saying, “having been personally involved in delivering this solution, I
have found Benning to be responsive, technically astute and customer focused.
It is clear to see, having visited Benning facilities within the UK and in Bocholt,
Germany, that Benning shares the same engineering principals and vision as
Orbital in the fact that we both want to deliver technically superior products at a
commercially viable price. n
CERN selects T-Systems
and Huawei for its
European Hybrid Cloud
T-Systems has been awarded a frame contract for a
joint Pre-Commercial Procurement (PCP), led by CERN,
that covers the design, prototyping and pilot phase of
the Helix Nebula Science Cloud. T-Systems, supported
by its technology partner Huawei, T-Systems will
develop a solution based on its Open Telekom Cloud
public cloud service launched in March 2016.
This €5.3 million joint PCP tender, led by CERN, will
establish a European hybrid cloud platform designed
to support high-performance, data-intensive scientific
use-cases sponsored by 10 of Europe’s leading
public research organisations and co-funded by the
European Commission. A total of 28 multinational
companies, SMEs and public research organisations
from 12 countries submitted bids during the summer.
The PCP will start with a design phase where the four
selected consortia will compete to go through to the
prototyping phase.
CERN is operating one of the world’s largest
OpenStack private clouds with more than 7,000
servers and 190,000 cores. n
Bright outlook for the European
dark fibre market
The latest survey of dark fibre in Europe reveals a much expanded market
with an increase of 45% in capacity available since 2015, more M&A
activity in this asset class, and wide variation in services and availability
across the 25 countries surveyed in the report.
The new report, Dark Fibre Europe IV, researched by BroadGroup, reveals
that dark fibre growth is being driven by a mix of wholesale product
availability by forward looking telcos, 4G mobile demand, data center
campus requirements and regulatory push in part responsible for national
telecom providers opening commercial availability.
Despite more than half of the installed base being controlled b y telcos,
the balance is operated by other players including utilities, municipal
authorities, specialist players and new entrants. Research for the report
records 50 more players than the previous 2015 study.
Some of the largest networks in terms of route km include Turkey
followed by Sweden. Nordic markets collectively operate more than 34%
of all dark fibre route km across the 25 markets included in the study.
European regulators are encouraging incumbent players to unbundle
their high-speed fibre networks, by offering a dark fibre product that can
be purchased by other telecom and mobile network companies. The report
suggests that reaction has been slow.
www.networkseuropemagazine.com