Nokia to provide data center switching solutions to Microsoft

Nokia has signed a multi-faceted deal with Microsoft to provide its data center switching solutions for the latter's data center facilities, the Finnish firm said on Wednesday.

In a media release, Nokia said that its data center switching portfolio platforms will deliver the additional networking scale and capacity Microsoft requires for its data center environments to support the bandwidth growth to its Microsoft Azure platform.

"Today's data centers have their own unique operational challenges, and Nokia has been working closely for some time now with Microsoft to understand its evolving data center needs and requirements. Our expertise in building high-performance, chassis-based systems was a key factor in our selection," said Vach Kompella, Vice President, IP Networks Division, Nokia.

As part of the deal, Nokia will supply its 7250 IXR chassis-based interconnect routers to support high-density 400GE applications in Microsoft's 'tier-2' network architecture. The 7250 IXR offers a broad range of high-performance chassis-based and fixed-form-factor options for data center top of rack (TOR), leaf, spine and super-spine applications.

The platforms support port speeds up to 400GE, with a path to 800GE, along with comprehensive IP and Ethernet feature sets. The solutions are easy-to-deploy and can adapt to meet your changing needs.

Nokia will also supply fixed-form-factor platforms into other Microsoft network applications.

Commenting on the partnership, David Maltz, Technical Fellow and Corporate Vice President, Microsoft Azure Networking, said, "Nokia's platforms were a natural choice to deliver the massive-scale interconnectivity that Microsoft requires. Nokia brings density, performance and flexibility to Microsoft's data center networks and cloud environments and is partnering with Microsoft to deliver chassis switches running the open source networking operating system SONiC."

The latest deal builds upon Nokia and Microsoft's collaboration as part of the open source SONiC initiative to develop chassis-based platforms focused on the requirements of high-capacity data centers.