CERN, also President TERENA SERENATE David Williams CERN, also President TERENA TNC 2002, Limerick June 2002

Topics What is SERENATE about? What are the strategic questions? Structure and timescales of SERENATE How can you participate?

What is SERENATE about?

The acronym SERENATE = Study into European Research and Education Networking as Targeted by eEurope Funded as an EC project – FP5 Looking at our strategic needs, say up to 5 years ahead NOT making detailed plans

Who are the partners? Academia Europaea Centre for Tele-informatics (CTI), Technical University of Denmark DANTE European Science Foundation TERENA (coordinating partner) We also anticipate considerable involvement from the NRENs, and hopefully of other actors, including industry

Strategic assumptions Three-level model Campus National (and sometimes also regional and metro) infrastructure European interconnect [inter-continental connectivity]

What are (some of) the strategic questions?

Strategic questions (1/3) What should the nature of NRENs be – how much technical expertise? – how much direct responsibility for operation? More crudely – and the question is sometimes posed to some of our members – why cannot commercial ISPs do everything? Now clear that we are moving from “best efforts IP” to multi-service networking – with a huge number of “end-to-end” services going across multiple organisational boundaries. How can this be handled? Remember the three layers (campus, NREN, European interconnect) – it is hard to balance the need for local autonomy (“subsidiarity”) with the users’ need for coherent high-quality “end-to-end” performance. From TAC discussion – NRENs cannot only provide low layer services - urgent to develop coherent infrastructure AAA (for example), but that’s across the campuses, the NRENs, the national university system(s) and international users communities (such as grids). How?

Strategic questions (2/3) Are present economic assumptions likely to evolve smoothly, or be disrupted? Optical fibre developments  much more bandwidth Turbulence in the bandwidth market Several examples of NRENs moving to “own” their own fibre infrastructure – is this a good idea or not? As far as I know at least Czech Republic, Poland and Switzerland have that as a declared goal, maybe others. NRENs traditionally worked with tertiary education – to what extent should they become involved with primary and secondary education? And what about 168/7 coverage (student lodging and week-end coverage) for higher education students? And what about libraries and healthcare/hospitals?

Strategic questions (3/3) What are networking needs of FP6 and the ERA? Are we addressing the proposals made in the Harbour Report? How should NRENs react to eEurope Action Plan? Council requested Commission to study higher speeds and connecting schools and libraries – SERENATE is part of that work In general - keep proposing ambitious goals What is the proper geographical extent of the “Europe” that the NRENs should feel concerned by? eEurope and ERA looking for “equality of opportunity” for researchers across different countries in Europe Should people with (much) higher costs have to pay higher charges? How could we alleviate discrepancies? What cost-sharing models can be recommended?

Out-of-scope strategic questions We should not try to tackle everything I believe that connectivity to “neighbouring” countries, such as Russia, NIS, SEE, Mediterranean, Caucasus, is very important politically. Actually trying to get to grips with the issues in each area is beyond the scope of SERENATE (IMO). Could eventually be done with more resources. I also believe that the issues of proper intercontinental connectivity are being handled effectively in the GEANT context, and do not need further attention here. [ Maybe need to keep some focus on the “end-to-end” service issues?]

Structure and Timescales of SERENATE

The EU project Runs from 1 May 2002 for 15 months, so until 30 July 2003 Total cost ~960 kEUR Comprises 14 areas of work, of which some workshops, some studies and some report writing

Workshops Initial workshop (17-18 Sept 2002 in La Hulpe, close to Brussels) Operators’ views on infrastructure status and evolution (~Nov 2002) Possible models for the future (~Dec 2002) User needs and priorities (Jan 2003, probably in Montpellier) Final workshop (~May/June 2003)

Initial Workshop (La Hulpe) By invitation. Mix of NREN staff, NREN funders, campus responsibles, real end users, some suppliers Interactive. To discuss and define scope and working approach. 150 max attendance – so a few per country Five break-out groups:- Technical evolution Economics Other user communities (schools, libraries, healthcare/hosptials,…..) Geography User needs

From the Web page… Technical perspectives LAN, WAN, switched circuits vs QoS bandwidth, optical networking Economic, commercial and financial perspectives including telecommunications regulations Needs of the research community for all disciplines of science, technology and the humanities) Needs of the education community (from Kindergarten to university education) and other user communities (libraries, museums, healthcare, etc.) Geography the borders of Europe, the “digital divide” inside Europe, connectivity to other continents, organisational issues).

Workshop participation We have some funding for each workshop In general you will have to cover your own travel and accomodation costs We do have some funding to support some participants who would not otherwise be able to attend

Reports A report will be generated after each workshop (see previous slide for list) PLUS Deployment and trends in transport and infrastructure market (~Jan 2003) Regulatory situation, especially for alternative approaches (~Jan 2003) Equipment trends (~Feb 2003) Telecoms market and infra deployment forecast (~April 2003) Possible infrastructure scenarios (~April 2003) Overall strategic plan – input to Final Workshop (~May/June 2003)

Other areas of work Education and other fields (libraries, healthcare….) Geographic coverage Equality of opportunity [Connectivity to neighbouring regions] [Intercontinental connectivity]

How can you participate?

NRENs This is your project – please participate actively in all workshops Especially the initial workshop – to give your input Your experts  regulatory evolution You technical staff  equipment evolution Your users  user needs and priorities Your local experts  extension of NRENs to early education, libraries and healthcare Your local experts  geographic coverage Many of these bullets are also directly applicable to ENPG members and potentially to members of other interested national bodies

Network and Infra Service Vendors Submit thoughts to Steering Committee Participate in operators’ workshop – its especially for you

Equipment vendors Submit thoughts to Steering Committee Participate in the “equipment trends” activity

More info and contacts

Steering Committee Bonac - ARNES - chairs “geographic” Butterworth - AE Davies - DANTE Jaume - RENATER - chairs “education and other” Liello - chair NREN Consortium Mayer - ESF Skouby - CTI Vietsch - TERENA Williams

Addresses http://www.serenate.org mailto:info@serenate.org

CERN, also President TERENA SERENATE David Williams CERN, also President TERENA TNC 2002, Limerick June 2002