Our Wholesale Network

Columbus Networks (CN) is owner and operator of the regions most powerful, multi-terabit, subsea fiber-optic cable network. Connecting 27 countries with over 30,000km of cable, the network is comprised of several high capacity subsea systems along with numerous terrestrial cable networks, interconnected to create the regions most flexible, diverse and reliable broadband Capacity Service platform.

Columbus’ subsea systems are engineered, manufactured and installed by industry leading suppliers and equipment manufacturers, including TE Subcom (Tyco), Alcatel, Nokia Siemens and Xtera. Given the unique physical aspects of subsea systems, all components are designed and built to the highest quality standards and redundancy, with ultimate system reliability supporting at least 25 years of continuous operation.

At the CN service layer, multiple 10Gbps optical wavelengths are transported over each cable system and connect to industry standard Synchronous Digital Hierarchy (SDH) multiplex equipment. The SDH equipment provides essential network timing, monitoring and path-protection switch function, in compliance with International Telecommunications Union (ITU-T) recommendation G.841 for Sub-network Connection Protection (SNCP). Through this design, in the case of network events such as a cable-cut or node outage, customer traffic instantly re-routes to alternate diverse facilities in less than 50 milliseconds without notice. Ring protection of all customer traffic also permits periodic network maintenance and graceful upgrade activity to be performed without impact to customer service.

In addition to providing customers highly quality large wholesale Capacity Service, CN has deployed overlay networks supporting full mesh Ethernet and IP Transit services (deployed over the same subsea network).

Based on four ultra-high capacity Juniper T1600 routers, the Columbus IP Transit service Core is engineered and managed to ensure the highest possible level of service quality and availability. With relentless attention to network diversity in mind, routers are configured in tandem and place at each of Columbus Networks Florida cable landing stations, located in North Miami Beach and Boca Raton. Multiple flexible edge aggregation routers provide customers with a wide choice of interface options and service speeds ranging from 45Mbit/s DS3 to 10Gbit/s LAN-PHY, using Juniper M320 and Cisco 7600 series equipment placed strategy in locations including Florida, Central America and the Caribbean. Carrier transit, Peer and Customer trunk connections operate on a ‘non-blocking’ basis, with continuous monitoring to ensure peak hour traffic never exceeds 50% trunk or system utilization under normal operation, thus providing ample ‘headroom’ to safeguard against the effects of periodic abnormal traffic patterns.

Separate from the IP Transit Service network, Columbus operates the region’s premier MPLS based Ethernet service network based on Juniper MX series routers, with network access points located in every operating country. The network is designed and operates in accordance with Metro Ethernet Forum recommendations and in 2011 the network was formally certified in accordance with MEF 9 and MEF 14 standards. MPLS network pipes are connected with meshed multi-GigE links, delivering customers the lowest latency Ethernet connectivity inter-region.

All Columbus network and services are monitored centrally from a single dedicated Network Operations Center (NOC), located in South Florida. In addition to the 24-hour bi-lingual NOC, Columbus operates a secondary backup NOC facility located in the ‘on-net’ island of Curacao. Our highly trained and skilled NOC staff manages all services using robust back office support systems (OSS) including Trouble Ticket, Transmission Network Management, Peakflow and IP Threat Intrusion and Mitigation systems (TIMS). The NOC also has secure visibility of remote network locations for monitoring key infrastructure such as power, backup power, HVAC, fire detection and suppression systems and site access control.

All network deployments and upgrades are governed by the Columbus core principal, “Build it once…build it right.”