CEO’s Report May 2013

Recently announced changes to the sector bring significant pressure to all institutions like never before and AARNet is responding in every way it can to provide solutions. Currently we are pushing hard to fast track many of our newly developed services with a view to providing institutions with the ability to continue to reduce costs they would either otherwise pay to external vendors or where big efficiency gains are the order of the day.

Cost effective services include Cloudstor, our large file sender service (which is currently provided to the sector at no charge!); Cloudstor+, our large storage service for researchers, which is currently in Beta testing and due for release in June. In addition, our NOC services are an immediate cost saving being sought by Universities to reduce the overheads for network monitoring with 24 x 7 Tier 1 support provided at the same time. Access to Cloud services, the Unified Communications Exchange, Virtual Meeting Rooms and Managed Communication Gateways are all becoming available to the sector as services that can be outsourced to AARNet in order to increase performance reliability and reduce costs.

Network traffic is up 53% compared to the same period in 2012, and continues to show explosive growth with international on net (86 %) and domestic off-peak (81%) the strongest categories.  Unmetered traffic has grown by 55% in the same period compared to 2012 and currently accounts for 84% of all traffic. AARNet and CAUDIT subcommittees have been working together for several months to review and make changes to member Access Agreements. This process is proceeding well and we are looking forward to a favourable resolution in the coming months.

The Research Data Storage Infrastructure Project (RDSI) is a $50M federally funded project under the Super Science (Future Industries) initiative. AARNet is working closely on the network design with RDSI nodes to develop the architecture to connect the Nodes to each other and to the greater research and education community.  All the remaining National Research Network (NRN) Projects are close to completion and several other major projects are well underway, including Adelaide to Shepparton, Perth to Geraldton, UNE Narrabri to Armidale and Heron Island Radio links.

The Australian eResearch Organisation (AeRO), of which AARNet is a member, is developing a framework to consolidate support structures so that it is relatively easy and seamless for an end researcher to find and use sector-wide services – Cloudstor is our first service to be integrated into this process.

Finally, AARNet has launched its Enterprise Services business in order to provide objective reviews of network and services operations for all institutions. The aim here is to provide a consulting service that is totally “independent” in its approach to developing more efficient technology practices and reducing IT /network costs. Coupled with this, AARNet has commenced full day workshops specifically tailored to the needs of each institution and covering areas of network design, infrastructure planning and product/solutions implementation – these are proving highly successful and are having a  greater impact on delivering cost effective services that truly matter.

Chris Hancock

Chief Executive Officer