TeliaSonera Press Release: DANTE renews its contract with TeliaSonera to buy IP transit services
Press Release
TeliaSonera International Carrier (TS IC) has gained continued confidence when DANTE renewed its contract to buy IP transit for the pan-European gigabit research network GÉANT. The deal confirms TS IC’s position as one of the leading suppliers of IP transit in Europe
27 May 2003 – The multi-million Euro contract represents one of TS IC's largest IP transit customers. In the terms of the contract, TS IC agree to supply IP connectivity with speeds ranging from 2.5 Gbit/s to STM-4, from the following six IP-nodes; London, Frankfurt, Hamburg, Zürich, Madrid and Milan.
“We made a thorough evaluation of TeliaSonera’s ability to maintain the provision of IP transit for the GÉANT network”, says Matthew Scott, Chief Financial Officer of DANTE. “The decision to extend our existing contract with TeliaSonera was based upon the company’s continued capability to meet our demanding requirements. They have proved to be a very reliable partner, and we are highly satisfied with what they offer.”
In July 2001, TS IC was appointed one of the main suppliers of international capacity in the build-up of the new GÉANT network. And in July 2002, TS IC became one of two suppliers providing IP transit to GÉANT in 18 European countries.
“In terms of usage, the volume of traffic transmitted to and from GÉANT has increased by 50 percent in the last six months”, says Anders Ericsson, Vice President and Head of Sales at TS IC. “As TeliaSonera International Carrier is also the supplier to the university networks Cesnet and Belnet, our company is the largest supplier of IP-transit to university networks in Europe. Our strong position on the IP market is also confirmed by the 47 per cent increase in revenues during last quarter compared to the same quarter year-on-year.”
About DANTE and the GÉANT network:
DANTE, a Cambridge based organisation set up to build and manage advanced network services for the European research and educational community, is the co-ordinating partner of the GÉANT consortium and responsible for the construction of GÉANT. GÉANT, the pan-European gigabit research network, enables European scientists to compete on an international stage by providing them with a world-class backbone that offers the bandwidth and the Quality of Service required for research and development activities at this level. It represents the basis for the introduction of 'virtual laboratories' and 'virtual institutes' in Europe. More information on DANTE and on GÉANT is available on the DANTE web site at http://www.dante.net.
About TeliaSonera:
TeliaSonera, formed through a merger of Telia and Sonera in December 2002, is the leading telecommunications group in the Nordic and Baltic regions. TeliaSonera is listed on the Stockholm Exchange, the Helsinki Exchanges and Nasdaq Stock Market in the USA. Pro forma Net sales January-March 2003 amounted to 20 billion SEK (EUR 2.2 billion).
The number of employees was 28,000.
More information:
Olof Joos
Segment Manager
TeliaSonera International Carrier,
Tel +46 8 713 32 25
Mob +46 70 660 38 39
Dale Robertson
Public Relations Manager
DANTE Ltd
press@dante.org.uk
Tel +44 1223 302992
