ARCast.net - 2012 and Network Convergence

Announcer: It's Tuesday, May 29th, 2007, and you're listening to ARCast.

Ron Jacobs: Hey, welcome back to ARCast. This is your host Ron Jacobs, and today on ARCast Radio we're going to be talking about the year 2012.


I know that sounds like way out in the future, but it's really not that far away, just a mere five years until the Olympic games in London. And this presents a lot of interesting opportunities, because when there's the Olympic Games people spend a lot of money to make everything work.


I'm talking about, they build stadiums, but they also build a lot of IT infrastructure. Because they have to broadcast everything and digital broadcast, there's a lot of network infrastructure that comes in place, it represents a great opportunity.


What if the Olympics were happening in your town, could you take advantage of this? Well, today we're going to talk to the guy who is working the plan, so let's welcome Alf Raju.


[applause]

Ron: Hey, this is Ron Jacobs, and welcome back to ARCast Radio. I'm delighted today to be here in Wales where I'm at the Architecture Insight Conference, and I'm joined by Alf Raju. Welcome, Alf.

Alf Raju: Hi, Ron. Nice to be here, thank you.

Ron: Now, tell me about this interesting title we have today "2012 and Network Convergence" What is that about?

Alf: Two things, London 2012 games happens in a little over five years, but also resides in a low-income poverty area of London. And the games is an opportunity to maximize some of the potential technology that's going to be used, but also we have visions of our own ideas around network convergence.

Ron: Man, that seems like a long ways off, 2012, you know. But like you say, its five years, and when it comes to Olympic Games that's not that far off.

Alf: No, it's not, it happens very quickly. When you think about it, it's little over a year ago when London won the bid, and that time had already gone by, and you're about a year from construction that kicks in. So thinking around technology, architecting those solutions, all need to start happening now.

Ron: Now, this isn't the first Olympic Games you've been involved with, you also worked on the Athens games right?

Alf: That's right, I worked on the Athens games, and that was very much from the program management side, and actually helping them manage and deliver the games, so a completely different focus.

Ron: Well, you know, most people when they about Olympic Games don't think about IT, right? You're thinking of athletes, and fans and things. But there's a lot of IT going on.

Alf: Absolutely, I mean it's a big underpinning factor in delivering the games, from the systems that will produce results, the information to journalists, the games times monitoring activities, and security.

Ron: Wow! So you mentioned to me you're working as a consultant to the local governments, and you're helping them to think about that there's all this stuff going to happen in their area, and what can you do with that afterwards, right?

Alf: That's right, yeah, I'm not working for local ODA, their the two bodies that deliver the games, I'm working for London borough as a technology adviser, with a legacy perspective as to what happens afterwards when everyone is gone, after twenty odd days.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: What do we do with all this stuff? Not just the venues and things, but actually there will be a lot of technology put in from the infrastructure upwards.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: And the role we're looking at, and my role is to actually see how we can maximize this opportunity, and create a model that could actually be used in other parts of London and nationally.

Ron: Now, I've been to visit some of the former Olympic sites, both in Barcelona and Sidney, and when you see all the things they created for the games, it is pretty amazing that for this brief three week period they build a ton of stuff, and you live with it for many years afterwards. So what kind of things are you thinking about looking at?

Alf: It presents an opportunity, it's here, it's going to happen, let's take full advantage of it, and not knock it. Something of this scale always will have issue, will have problems, and you'll have people trying to shoot it down. But it's a great opportunity, and we're looking to, and what we would like to deliver on our vision is...


And we mentioned network convergence, well the borough has a view that it's not individual pieces of technology anymore, your telecoms, your IT, your network, it's actually all now moving to IP, everything will run over an IP-based architecture.

Ron: All right, yeah.

Alf: So if you look at it at the infrastructure level, you need hardware and systems, but then you need a network infrastructure which is IP-based, which means you can run anything over it, it' shareable, or it's not shareable, you can chop it up as and when you want.


So, for instance, if you think where the Olympic park is, it's surrounded by four other boroughs, there's potential for us to connect up the other boroughs and use services, for example a datacenter that could be shared. Rather than having five separate datacenters, we could actually have one that we all share.


Because of the infrastructure that will go in to this area, it's actually what we call brown-field site, there's nothing there at the moment.

Ron: Ah, yeah.

Alf: Yeah, so the whole landmass where this is going to be build, there's absolutely nothing. We've got the opportunity to put in all the utilities infrastructure, plus the ducting for networking infrastructure, the mass for radio communications.


I mean, all this obviously will be the responsibility of the games delivery bodies, but we have an interest in it, because we're the people that are going to be left with it.

Ron: So this is actually a good idea for them to bring you in to this, because if you guys don't say anything the games are going to do whatever they want to do.

Alf: Absolutely.

Ron: And when it's all over with you're going to be left with whatever they leave, or don't leave. So if you're a little proactive you can influence what they are going to be doing.

Alf: Correct, and that's what we're trying to do, is show them our capabilities. But also look to bring more credibility to the borough with other key partners in the industry who've got this experience.


I mean, we're a local company, we're not telecom specialists or network specialists, but we'll use the keys skills in the market.

Ron: OK, all right. So where do you begin?

Alf: Where do we begin? Well, the first thing is to start looking with our own infrastructure that we've got in place. NERM are quite unique, in that we invested in to a dark fiber network, IP network, some years ago which has paid dividends, saved us a lot of money. And what we want to do is expand that, it will give us a backbone, which we potentially can run a wireless capability over it, and given WiMAX technology coming along, and what Intel are planning.


There's lots of things there that could be supported of this backbone. The other thing are media, digital media for example, where it could be used for community messaging, big screens used for community messaging. But also advertising, so there's a revenue potential there.

Ron: OK.

Alf: Which would support some of the investment that we would need.

Ron: You know, it's funny, because I guess I had never really thought much about local government caring so much about an IT infrastructure. But when you think about, I mean they are competing with other areas for business and for investment, they want to show that they've got the capabilities there.

Alf: Absolutely right, and local government... And I think markets have recognized that as well, local and national...

Alf: Well, absolutely right. And local government, and I think Microsoft recognized that as well, local and national government has a huge agenda to move things into the electronic space.


But also, as I said, we're quite an innovative borough. We've thought about a lot of things over the years and done things that a lot of people would think, "These guys are mad," including some of the big commercial companies who didn't look at us at all when we wanted to put the fiber infrastructure in.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: So we did it ourselves.

Ron: [laughs]

Alf: And now we're not going to sell it to anyone either. [laughs]

Ron: Now when you mentioned the fiber, you said it's dark fiber. By that you mean that it was fiber, you put the fiber in but it wasn't necessarily switched on?

Alf: Absolutely. It's switched on in some places, so there's still capacity.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: And this is something we feel we could help the Olympics with, certainly in the construction phase, but also some of the other developments going on in the area.

Ron: Right.

Alf: So if you take, there is what we call a "retail mixed-use complex" being built near to the Olympic park. Well, they're going to need some kind of connectivity during construction phase.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: What we're suggesting is "Well, you could use some of our backbone for wireless capability until you've actually sunk your utilities into the ground and your ducting into the ground."

Ron: Oh, OK.

Alf: So that would, again, drive some revenue. That also drives our credibility, but it also gives us the opportunity to expand that network. And at the end of the day, our focus is the people of the borough, the Olympic borough, the people of Newham, to give them something back out of these games.


I mean technologies are intangible in some ways. They'll see the venues and things like that. They could use the aquatic center and so on and so forth once the games are over. But underpinning it, as I said earlier on, technology underpins a lot of things; it's an enabler.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: You don't see it but it does lots of things in the background. And it's for the people; that's where we're looking to this. And give the businesses in the area the opportunity to get connected into the information highway.

Ron: OK, so in your role in this, you mentioned one of the things is to work with these other four boroughs that are adjoining. Are you having to kind of get with their people and negotiate, to try to get them on board with this?

Alf: Well, we're just starting to do that, to explain the vision, how we plan to take it forward and actually take their thinking on board as well now. I mean the reason why we didn't do it at the outset is it's too complex from a political level to try and actually get some sort of traction on this. Now is sort of the right time because we've actually got the vision and strategy mapped out. And it makes sense because of certain things happening around the park itself that need to bring the other boroughs into the discussions and moving forward the delivery of this.

Ron: Oh, OK. All right. So you've made some beginnings, where does the project stand now?

Alf: Well, the project stands, I guess, looking at a commercial opportunity. How we actually start to deploy some of this infrastructure, how we actually try to get some of this revenue in, and actually getting the other boroughs to join in. So there are actual specific discussions going on around, for example, CCTV, which is very important post-games, pre-games, and games time.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: I've done it backwards.

Ron: [laughs]

Alf: But whichever phase you look at, CCTV is a key piece in security.

Ron: Right.

Alf: Again, it comes back, as I mentioned, about a datacenter. We could actually share the CCTV functions. And we already do some of that across the boroughs because of the boundaries. So I'm actually having discussions with specific people in other boroughs around that piece of technology, how we can move it on to the IP platform. Because most of us have CCTV running over analog circuits at the moment.

Ron: Right, yeah. It seems to me, maybe in the future if you had your WiMAX capability in place, maybe even some of these running over wireless.

Alf: Absolutely. That's already in the plan to have, because you're going to need a mix of fixed and mobile capability. You may need to move cameras around very quickly to specific areas. And we've been looking at some of that technology, what's out in the market in terms of some low powered wireless cameras but with good definition.

Ron: Yeah. Right.

Alf: Because underneath CCTV, and this is something we've already done and quite advanced, again, as a borough, is using software for facial recognition, number plate recognition. So things like that, which can do the matching and analysis, there's a lot of software underneath this. And the sponsors to the games--Atos Origin--are one of the key components in delivering IT security.

Ron: Ah, yeah. And you're right about the definition of this. So many times I see these programs on TV where they show the CCTV footage and they show crimes happening and that, and then they say "Well, we couldn't identify this person, it's too blurry or it's not quite enough." And I think "Well, why did you have a camera if it's not even going to work?"

Alf: You've got to have the software behind it and the right type of camera. And these are the things that we've been looking at already. And it's paid dividends in the borough-- crime has been reduced. But also, throw in something else. What we've done in the borough is actually encourage a lot of the kids into sport.

Ron: Oh, yeah.

Alf: And that's reduced crime. So it's got nothing to do with technology.

Ron: [laughs]

Alf: But again, if you think about it, we're putting in place the sport systems to monitor the programs the young athletes are going through. So again, you've got IT somewhere in there. And infrastructure, architecting that solution, all these things need to happen. And it's stuff like people like us do--yourself, Microsoft--but the general public don't really see that.

Ron: Oh, sure. So I was kind of surprised to hear you mention the datacenter because, again, it's something you don't think of--a borough having a datacenter or some kind of complex IT infrastructure. So I can understand the CCTV capability, needing to have central monitoring, what are things you're looking at in the datacenter?

Alf: Well currently our datacenter is running on HP Blade servers, so it's fairly new. It supports all our applications, from the benefits systems to the housing systems to the counsel rates, but also CRM. We have a CRM model we're running. And a number of the other systems that need to support all the services we deliver to the community.

Ron: Oh, yeah.

Alf: OK, and of course, the data that needs to be stored. For example, the planning information, the planning applications. So that's when the individuals or SMEs or large contractors come in to build something in the borough there's a planning application process to go through. And that holds huge amounts of data because it's GIS-based as well.

Ron: Yeah. It seems like maybe there would be an opportunity, if you built a great datacenter, to share this not only at a facility level but maybe even server capacity and things with some of the other boroughs who maybe just want to, in effect, sort of outsource that capacity to you guys.

Alf: Yeah, we've looked at that. And there's a northeast London partnership that exists between a number of boroughs where we've been looking at a joint data recovery center, or disaster recovery center I should say.

Ron: Oh, right.

Alf: Rather than each of us, again, having an individual DR plan and DR location, well let's have one that we can all use.

Ron: Sure.

Alf: So that thinking is there. And conversely, the main datacenter and the disaster recovery, what we're thinking is, well for the games time they're going to need two, you need a primary and a secondary. Well, we could potentially provide that capability or work with the games organizers to deliver that.

Ron: Oh! So that would be a great benefit, to help them cover the cost of your recovery center.

Alf: Correct. And it leaves the legacy behind, which is one of they key pieces of the London bid, in terms of not just the technology, but the venues. What kind of legacy is going to be left behind in London, for the venues, the park? But if you think, once all the Games are over, well, how do we manage those venues? You need some kind of systems. You need some sort of infrastructure to connect them...

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: Manage them. Manage the park. So it's all those things, really. There's that bigger picture. Obviously, we're interested in the local area, but it can affect and influence the bigger picture.

Ron: Well, it's amazing, because, for this brief moment, there's a lot of companies--the television networks and so forth--who are going to spend a lot of money to bring an infrastructure together to broadcast the Games worldwide.

Alf: Yeah.

Ron: And I imagine that, once it's over, they've pretty much already sunk that cost. They will probably just get up and walk away, and leave behind whatever.

Alf: That's right. And we want to see how we can take advantage of that. That's the important thing. And it's important to get that thinking done now, as we were saying earlier, so we can influence some of those decisions, for the benefit of the communities.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: Which will drive, potentially, trainings, skills, more job opportunities. There's a whole bunch of things that could come out of this.

Ron: So what kind of things are you looking for? You mentioned earlier some of the things that Intel is doing, and others--things around WiMAX. What are you looking at for the community, in this regard?

Alf: Well, for the community--it's interesting. A survey was done, and the kids are more interested in their mobile connectivity through the Internet than rather having a PC at home.

Ron: Ah.

Alf: So with the WiMAX, or whatever wireless technologies that come along, it's not only for that younger population--the games, the information. But also, if you think of community centers, or buildings that are hard to get to--the last mile, that is very difficult to get a wire down.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: Well, if you've got a wireless cloud over it, it gives those communities, it gives those people, access to the Internet.

Ron: That's fascinating, that the kids would rather do the mobile device, but it's not surprising. Having a couple of teenagers in my home...

Alf: [laughs] Yeah.

Ron: I was shocked to see, when I opened the bill, that my oldest son had sent nearly 2, 000 text messages in a month. [laughs]

Alf: Well, that's what they do. And the fact is, you can even MSN on a mobile...

Ron: [laughs]

Alf: So it's done. I've got the same thing. My kids are a bit older; but yeah, the youngest teenager, he's on his phone. And what I did was I switched him to a contract phone.

Ron: Uh-huh.

Alf: It saved the house phone, now.

Ron: [laughs]

Alf: The house phone, the landline, doesn't get used. [laughs]

Ron: I don't even know why I bother with the landline anymore. I'm thinking about getting rid of it.

Alf: Absolutely. Well, again, it comes back to this convergence piece, in terms of telecoms, we're moving towards.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: And once Windows Mobile six comes in--actually IP on the mobile side--once that's done, I think we will see a lot of people leaving landlines behind.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: I think most of us do already. We use our mobiles so much, for different means of communications--either texting, as you say, video phoning, sending pictures. And the kids, what they do with it is just something else really. [laughs]

Ron: [laughs]

Alf: [laughing] Including the games that you can get.

Ron: That's true. That's true, yeah. It's too tempting for them to have this capability to download something--a ringtone or a game or something--and they don't think about what the cost is. [laughs]

Alf: What the cost is, yeah. There is a cost associated. But again, that's one of our vision thinking: "Well, OK. How can we reduce this cost to the community? How can we bring it to them, without a huge overhead for them?"

Ron: So are you thinking that, eventually, these devices will access your WiMAX cloud instead of the telco network?

Alf: Telco network. Yeah, that's an option, and we have to consider that.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: But it doesn't mean they won't be able to access the telco, because there will be, potentially, other sets of services that they will want that we won't be providing.

Ron: Sure.

Alf: Our main aim is to provide the connectivity.

Ron: Yeah.

Alf: And once you've got that and taken that cost away from them, then pay services, etcetera--pay on demand, what have you--that's up to the individual user to make that choice.

Ron: How does this relate to--when you think about the companies that want to deliver television over an IP network, or you have the telcos and all these other private companies that will want to leverage this network, you're putting the fiber in place, as kind of a general infrastructure, then you sell access to them?

Alf: Well, potentially, that's what we would do. We'll have the capacity to sell access. We have to separate it out from Games time; that's very separate. The Games time, if you like, will be an island site. It has to be secure, it can't be connected to anything else, and it's focused to deliver mission-critical operation.

Ron: Right.

Alf: But once that's gone, there's no reason why we can't start to interconnect with our own infrastructures.

Ron: Oh, yeah.

Alf: It will increase the capacity. but yes, from my own perspective, our own infrastructure, we would look to sell that capacity.

Ron: It seems like, if you were in the local government game, you would say, "Any time anybody's digging up somewhere--digging up streets or digging up for a building--we ought to just take advantage of, while the ground's up, to put some fiber in there and get it done."

Alf: Absolutely. Absolutely. Now, that's something I think is being done, probably, in parts of the country, but certainly in the Newham area. Where any new developments are going in, there's a section 106--it's a planning act that requires developers to put in ducting that can take fiber into the homes or offices, whatever they happen to be, so you don't have to dig the road up again.

Ron: Yeah, exactly. Because I was thinking about, in the neighborhood I used to live in, just a couple years ago, I was noticing that they were going through, ripping up all the streets and doing this kind of stuff...

Alf: Yeah. And they do it several times, too, I'll bet.

Ron: [laughs] Yeah, yeah. And someone was asking me if they were ripping up our neighborhood. But it's relatively new, it's only two years old, so I'm pretty sure they put the fiber in before they built anything.

Alf: Yeah.

Ron: I can't wait till they actually do something with it. [laughs]

Alf: When they light it up, yeah. Well, that's the next piece of the trick, is lighting that network up.

Ron: Yeah, yeah. Right now, we're kind of held hostage to the old cable companies. Yeah, they do a fair job with the broadband connectivity and so forth, but it's the only choice you have, really.

Alf: Yeah, so there's no competition there. And this is what something like this will do--drive that competition up and improve and reduce the cost of services.

Ron: Well, I certainly hope so, because I'm paying way to much [laughs] for that broadband.

Alf: [laughs]

Ron: Wow. This is really interesting. Thanks so much, Alf, for sharing with us today.

Alf: Yeah. Pleasure, Ron.


[applause]

Ron: Alf Raju, ladies and gentlemen, with some great thoughts on planning for the future. Wow. When you think about it, five years is not that long, especially when things are going to be built today. Plans are in place, and they're already building stuff. And if you want to take advantage of this, you've got to be positioned well to do it.


And I think it was a wise move of the city council there to think about this and to begin planning. You think, "Wow! Is this the work of an architect?" Absolutely it is, because it takes somebody who understands the technology, who also is politically adept--somebody who can bring together all of the parties to make good things happen, in technology. That's what an architect does, my friends.


We'll see you next time on ARCast.

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