e-infrastructures: experiences from the Middle and Eastern Europe Marek redniawa redniawa Consulting marek@sredniawa.com, tel. +48 602 210799 Eu-MED Event 2: E-infrastructures in the Mediterranean Amman, November 4, 2008
Plan of the presentation Introduction e-infrastructures in M&EE Experiences to share Conclusions and recommendations 2
Introduction
Background information Identification and formulation of the ENPI-South Regional Programme to support the development of the Information Society in the Euro- Mediterranean Region A project coordinated by the EC Delegation Office in Egypt Acknowledgements to Ahmed BADR and Daniel WEISS Team of consultants: Yacine Khelladi (Team Leader) and Marek redniawa Duration and scope Based on analysis and meetings with 60 senior ICT, R&D, NRENs officers in 5 countries (Algeria, Egypt, Jordan, Morocco,Tunisia) 2 months September 2007, December 2007/January 2008 Project goal: to support and to further improve mutually beneficial cooperation in the area of Information Society between Europe and the Mediterranean Partner Countries, building on the achievements of EUMEDIS and other Regional initiatives 4
The key findings 1/2 A fundamental need to ensure that research network interconnectivity between Europe and the MEDA countries is promoted and sustained A critical infrastructure for building harmonized EU-MEDA Information Society and an enabler for closer cooperation in R&D in ICT and for maintaining and increasing participation of MEDA countries in FP7 Rationalization of its use and increased share of national and bilateral funding required 5
The key findings 2/2 Need to harmonize long term sustainability of EUMEDCONNECT with development and interconnection of regional NRENs - CAMREN initiative Intervention strategy tailored to enhance the momentum for a sustainable Euro-Mediterranean regional dialogue in the field of Information Society Policy support and ownership that will ensure the sustainability of the cooperation actions in the region together with developing capacity, supporting lobbying and leveraging (in particular from bilateral funding), promoting cost shared strategies, synergies, economies of scale and public-private partnerships and thus ensure sustainability 6
Proposed intervention strategies Research network connectivity EUMEDCONNECT2 ensure long term sustainability and effective impact of the infrastructure support 50% of connectivity cost as the EC contribution for the first 18 months ensure full sustainability with other resources and budgets, after that period capitalize on human network of EUMEDCONNECT, EUMEDGRID, MED-IST Support greater participation of the MEDA countries researchers in the FP7 calls monitor progress, participation in the FP7, but also national investments in R&D, and other policy levels indicators elaborate a support framework for assisting the authorities of the MEDA countries in the implementation of their national ICT R&D agendas 7
Expected results The EUMEDCONNECT 2 is in place and constitutes a sound base for the MEDA region e-infrastructures Increased usage of the network for specific research and development applications and enhanced impacts are measured MEDA partners are eligible for FP7 projects! Documented usage and impacts, together with technical assistance, enable to lobby successfully for funding national governments and other donors There is an enhanced capacity of partners for EUMEDCONNECT2 network self management CAMREN development Crossborder initiatives 8
e-infrastructures in the Middle & Eastern Europe
General view of MEE countries Starting point a gap between old and new EU members and digital divide Remarkable progress made by new EU members NRENs during 2003-2008 period Substantial support from EC Capitalizing previous experience and contacts from FP5 and FP6 and other EU research programs Tradition of NRENs e.g. 15 years in Poland Increase in the number of universities and R&D centres connected at Gb speeds Different local legal and economic environment Pioneering dark fiber approach 10
PIONIER network - Polish Optical Internet Own fibre optic lines Leased fibre optic lines Fibre optic lines to be built in 2008 11
Building of networking infrastructure in Poland Polish NREN - PIONIER network managed and built by Pozna Supercomputing and Networking Center PSNC Dark fiber deployment since 2001 Partnerships with operators both state owned and private companies Co-investment with PBT HAWE a private network construction company and fiber network infrastructure operator Contract with PBT HAWE based on the cost sharing rule 40% - 60% Building of ca 2500 km of fiber optic lines for the national backbone 3 fiber cable pipes PBT HAWE 2 fiber cable pipes PSNC PIONIER 12
PIONIER economy behind Quick economic analysis (2002) Relying on the commercial telco offers annual connectivity costs for 21 MANs: 622Mb/s channels from telco (real cost) : 4.8 mln 2.5Gb/s channels from telco (estimation) : 9.6 mln 10Gb/s channels from telco (estimation) : 19.2 mln PIONIER investment building 5200km of fiber network, 10GE : 55.0 mln Annual PIONIER OAM costs : 2.1 mln ROI 3rd year! calculations made on the basis that only one lambda is used 13
PIONIER cross-border dark fiber (DF) connectivity e-region E-region as implementation of e- Europe at micro scale Areas: education, medicine, natural disasters, information bases, protection of environment Existing - Czech Republic, Germany and Slovakia e-region Soon - Ukraine End of 2008 - Belarus, Lithuania and Russia 14
National e-infrastructure activities as a catalyst High Performance Computing and Visualization with the SGI Grid for Virtual Laboratory Applications Industrial partners ATM, Silicon Graphics Inc. Regular yearly international Grid workshops since 2000 PROGRESS - Polish Research On GRid Environment for Sun Servers CLUSTERIX National Cluster of Linux Systems a concept of dynamic computing resorces PL-Grid - full compatibility and interoperability with European and worldwide Grids 15
PSNC Coordinated European Projects 16
Porta Optica partners 17
Porta Optica Study in a nutshell EC co-financing Instrument: SSA (Specific Support Actions FP6) Duration: 1 year Start: 01/02/2006 End: 31/01/2007 12 project partners 3 regions Eastern Europe: Belarus, Ukraine, Moldova Baltic states: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania Southern Caucasus: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia 9 beneficiary countries: 1400 scientific institutions 700 higher education institutions > 2.5 mln students 135 cities > 36 mln people 18/27 18
Porta Optica Main Goals & Objectives Stimulation and consolidation of initiatives to ensure the successful, dark-fiber based research network deployment in the Eastern Europe, Baltic states and Southern Caucasus regions A chance for close cooperation in scientific projects, by means of providing multichannel/multilambda Internet connections to the neighbouring countries An easy way to extend GEANT to Eastern European countries A distributed optical gateway to eastern neigbours of Poland Objectives: Identification of user communities and their requirements Assessment of fiber infrastructure availability Performing fiber network case studies and deployment scenarios Raising project awareness and results dissemination 19
Porta Optica results Successful high-speed national research networks deployment in all beneficiary countries mainly based on dark fiber (DF) Real NREN plans regarding dark fiber deployment All countries of Baltic States migrate to optical technology using purchased/ leased DF Progress in connectivity in all countries involved Mobilization of many sources of e-infrastructure funding NRENs plans are known for decision makers Specified international cross border dark fiber connections (EE-LV, LV-LT, LT-PL, UA-PL, UA-SK, UA-MD, MD-RO) Belarus, Moldovia and Ukraine are partners in GN3 proposal Black See Connectivity, Baltic GRID I/II, relation with SEEREN, SEEGRID 20
Porta Optica - status of selected NRENs NREN Form of organization State budget Users, clients Funding Other sources ARENA Armenia Foundation 10% 0% 90% international donors: OSI, NATO, UNDP, ISTC, Eurasia Foundation, CRDF UARNet/ NASU Ukraine Separate state owned legal entity 5% 95% 0% LATNET - Latvia EENet - Estonia Department of the university 35% 27% 38% Separate state owned legal entity 71.2% 0.3% 28.5% Source: Porta Optica: Deliverable D.1.2v3 (update): NREN Status and Development Plans www.porta-optica.org 21
Porta Optica - users of NRENs infrastructures Source: Porta Optica: Deliverable D.1.2v3 (update): NREN Status and Development Plans www.porta-optica.org 22
MEE e-infrastructures - main obstacles NRENs in some countries of Eastern Europe still are not able to use dark fibers freely reluctance of fiber providers to share their resources (in all countries) scarceness of fiber footprint (e.g. Moldova) monopoly and regulations not allowing creating CBDF points (e.g. Belarus) lack of proper funding and support from the government lack of offers for DF lease/purchase in Ukraine seriously slows process of building high-speed networks. 23
e-infrastructures - experiences to share
E-infrastructures experiences to share 1/2 Build e-infrastructure and the users will come approach won t work Need for clear goals and revealing needs and requirements of the scientific and R&D community, and industry Importance of integration of user communities User friendly access In line with habits of the community and the way they work Assistance to the users community support in adoption of new practices training, on-line education materials, helpdesks, consultancy, embedded requirements capturing etc. However costly is a must otherwise usage will be limited only to technically oriented people and will grow slowly Openess to bottom up innovation processes driven by end-user experimentation and demands 25
E-infrastructures experiences to share 2/2 Application-neutrality and openess to all user communities and resource providers National funding bodies should give priority to fund multi-disciplinary infrastructures rather than narrow disciplinary-specific alternatives Inter-operability and compatibility with international standard services and protocols as priority for funding Avoid short term approach to funding it is inefficient and does not support sustainability Cross border dark fibre and e-region approach works Consider leap frogging Fully optical networks - optical switching Change of P2P services by P2P fibres E2E lightpath on demand 26
Key sustainability factors Sound support at national government level to secure long term funding based on the recognition of the role of e-infrastructures Diversity of applications and services Stimulation of real demand for e-infractructures Proactive approach in looking for many sources of funding Local initiatives and involvement in projects Networking activities and cooperation needed at many levels Institutions NRENs, Universities, R&D centers, industrial partners, SMEs Research and project teams People-to-people human networking Foster cooperation with neighboring countries Remember about Web 2.0 and social networking! social grid 27
Conclusions e-infrastructures fundamental for long term development and to counteract the Digital Divide and the Brain Drain Capitalization of EUMEDGRID and EUMEDCONNECT experience necessary e-infrastructures technical aspects as well as human networking across the Mediterranean aspects Clear support signal at high political level Declaration of the Second Euro-Mediterannean Ministerial Conference on the Information Society, Cairo 27 February 2008 DREAM FP7 proposal - Definition of a Roadmap for an e-infrastructure in Africa and the Middle-east FP7 Call 5 - INFRA-2009-1.2.x - ICT based e- Infrastructures: grid infrastructures, virtual research communities FP7-INFRASTRUCTURES-2008-1 / INFRA-2008-3.2 Coordination & Support Action Experts from MEE can offer assistance (PSNC, and others) Special thanks to people from PSNC: Maciej Stroi ski and Artur Binczewski for assistance in preparing this presentation 28