OREANDA-NEWS. NEC Corporation, Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation, NTT Communications Corporation, Fujitsu Limited and Hitachi, Ltd. announced the launch of the "Open Innovation over Network Platforms" research and development (R&D) project. Also known as the "O3 (O Three) Project,"*1 this project is based on research consigned via the Ministry of Internal Affairs and Communications' "Research and Development of Network Virtualization Technology," and is jointly promoted by the five companies.

This is the world's first R&D project that seeks to make a variety of wide area network elements compatible with Software-Defined Networking (SDN*2), including platforms for comprehensively integrating and managing multiple varieties of wide area network infrastructure and applications.

While SDN has already been introduced in corporate networks, such as those at data centers (DCs), this project facilitates research and development in order to apply SDN to wide area network infrastructure, such as that of telecommunications carriers and Internet providers.

The project aims to achieve wide area SDN that will enable telecommunications carriers to reduce the time to design, construct and change networks by approximately 90? when compared to conventional methods. This will enable service providers to dramatically reduce the time needed to establish and withdraw services.