News for and about the Internet2 community

[Greg Wood <>]

THE QUILT EXPANDS INTERNET SERVICES PROJECT

Cogent Communications, Global Crossing, and WilTel Named Preferred 
Providers to Deliver Advanced Network Services For Research and 
Educational Consortium

Richmond, Va., August 9, 2004 – The Quilt(tm) a coalition of advanced 
regional networking organizations, today announced it has selected 
Cogent, Global Crossing, and WilTel as new Authorized Quilt Vendors 
(AQV) for Internet service to offer high performance network services as 
part of The Quilt's Commodity Internet Services (CIS) project. The Quilt 
also extended existing AQV agreements with Level 3 Communications and 
Qwest Communications.

The Quilt provides a forum for advanced regional network organizations 
and others dedicated to advancing research and education in the United 
States. The CIS project aggregates the buying power of The Quilt 
participants to get the best value and lowest priced commodity Internet 
services. Participants in The Quilt together used over 20 gigabits per 
second of commercial Internet connectivity in 2003.

"The Quilt participants serve over one hundred institutions, whose 
aggregated bandwidth requirements for commodity Internet service are 
expected to grow to nearly 25 gigabits per second in the next year," 
said Hudnall Croasdale, Executive Director of The Quilt. "The companies 
selected by The Quilt to be authorized Internet service providers will 
help meet The Quilt's institutions’ crucial need to move large amounts 
of data quickly, reliably, and cost-effectively, bringing the power of 
this technology to bear on their organizations' service delivery."

Specific parameters met by the companies selected as AQVs for Internet 
Service include:

+ National pricing for The Quilt participants;

+ Peering, including number and location of public and private peering 
points;

+ Availability of advanced services such as Multicast and IPv6; and

+ Backbone and support services.


About The Quilt(TM)
The Quilt gathers more than 20 leading research and education networking 
organizations in the United States to promote consistent, reliable, 
interoperable and efficient advanced networking services that extend to 
the broadest possible community; and to represent common interests in 
the development and delivery of advanced network services. Participants 
in The Quilt provide network service for more than 200 Internet2 
universities and thousands of other educational institutions. Internet2, 
a university-led research and development consortium, provides 
organizational support for The Quilt. For more information, see: 
www.thequilt.net

Contact
Greg Wood
Internet2
(202) 331-5360