"NEC has now successfully tested a Software-Defined Networking solution, including OpenFlow controller and switches, in a multi-vendor environment. We are pleased to have demonstrated the mature performance and implementation of SDN, and these results will give our customers an added degree of confidence in using Programmable Flow Series," said Morio Ito, chief manager, Converged Network Division, NEC Corporation, as NEC successfully completed interoperability testing of its SDN solution "NEC PF Series Programmable Flow Switch and Controller (Programmable Flow Series)," during several weeks of EANTC (European Advanced Network Test Center's) SDN Interoperability testing in Berlin.



NEC will showcase these technologies at the MPLS & Ethernet World Congress, V6 World Congress, SDN Summit in Paris (19-22 March 2013).

EANTC invited vendors to participate in a number of interoperability tests over a three week period. More than 40 vendor engineers were on-site to support testing at the EANTC lab. One of the test areas was exclusively dedicated to SDN. OpenFlow was selected as the management protocol for this test, which took place from February 4 to 8.

"The Programmable Flow Series that launched in March 2011 was the world's first generation of network equipment with OpenFlow technologies and it has already been adopted by customers such as NTT Communications and Nippon Express Co.," Ito added.

The Programmable Flow Series tested in categories that reflect NEC's focus on OpenFlow technologies in coordination with resilient Carrier Ethernet services. Looking forward, NEC will continue interoperability tests with leading global vendors to provide its solution for global operators quickly and smoothly.

NEC's Programmable Flow Series took part in the following tests:

• Topology Discovery via Link Layer Discovery Protocol (LLDP)
• Layer 2 and layer 3 forwarding
• Failure recovery
• Policy based routing

During the three weeks of intensive testing, the EANTC team verified a wide range of successful results and created a demonstration network as a showcase for the tested technologies. This demonstration network will be exhibited at the MPLS & Ethernet World Congress, V6 World Congress, SDN Summit in Paris (19-22 March 2013).