Data centre operator Micron21 upgrades with Brocade core routers

Stuart Corner
Wednesday, 08 June 2011 18:01

IT Industry - Deals

Melbourne based data centre operator, Micron21 has selected Brocade Networks MLXe Series core routers as the network foundation for its data centre expansion project.

It has deployed two MLXes at its main data centre in thee Melbourne suburb of Kilsyth and two more at a data centre in the Melbourne CBD where it rents space. All four are interconnected with dedicated fibre to create a mesh network to support Micron21's new high-availability IP services and mission-critical hosting  services.

James Braunegg, infrastructure manager of Micron21, told iTWire that the MLXes enabled the company to evolve its data centre network from the traditional three tier architecture (core, aggregation and access) to a flat fabric based architecture.

"We are removing the aggregation switches because what the MLX provides us it really is the aggregation switch. So within each data centre they terminate almost to the top of rack solutions and we are looking at possible fabric technologies to flatten that completely.

He added: "Our switching right now is still Cisco but we are embarking on phase one of our data centre expansion and all the switching is being replaced. When finished a flat fabric based architecture across two data centres."

Braunegg explained that Micron21 operated its data centre at very high densities, and was embarking on a very significant expansion.

'We specialise in selling colocation capacity at the RU [rack unit] level. We don't sell racks, we don't sell rooms; we sell single server colocation or virtual serves so our density is extremely high. We will put close 42 RU servers in a single rack. So the amount of throughput in each port is enormous."

He added: "We are planning a data centre expansion of about 1600 percent, by about 2014. What we are doing now will give us a 300 percent increase in capacity and that will be finished by the end of the year, but that is only stage one."

To support this rapid expansion, Braunegg said: "We needed the port density and the raw routing performance power to sustain large volumes of traffic. The core cannot be the weakest point of the network."  He added that, should demand arise the MLXes were capable of operating at 100gbps, compared to the 1Gbps at which the company's data centre network presently operates.

Micron21's goal is to support the deployment of 160 additional data centre racks over 18 months to boost its service offerings and improve its security capabilities. It is also looking for a smoother migration path toward supporting higher levels of virtualisation and integration with its existing usage-based billing system.