BIAL Extends Managed Services Contract With Nortel

Bangalore International Airport Limited (BIAL) is a public limited company under the Companies Act formed to build, own and operate Bangalore's Greenfield, private sector-owned and operated airport – the Bengaluru International Airport. BIAL has extended its end-to-end Managed Services Contract with Nortel for three years.

Nortel will manage BIAL’s entire IT infrastructure, which includes data and wireless network systems, and will oversee network security. This network will be managed remotely through Nortel’s Network Operations Center (NOC) in India, which will continue to ensure the high level of reliability and dependability the airport requires.

"Over the past year, the airport has handled 8.7 million passengers and over 120,000 aircraft movements. By managing our critical networks, Nortel has relieved us of our network concerns and has made it possible for BIAL to focus its resources on managing the core aviation business, rather than the voice and data networks," said Marcel Hungerbuehler, CEO, BIAL.

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BIAL leases the data and voice network to its various tenants, including airlines, restaurants, cargo handlers and other groups, which manage their own, round-the-clock operational applications. All passenger-centric critical business applications such as baggage handling and tracking, ticketing, passenger handling and free WiFi Internet connectivity at BIAL run on Nortel’s communication infrastructure. Nortel’s voice solution provides a carrier-grade VoIP network across the entire airport, connecting approximately 1,000 VoIP points. Nortel’s data network connects approximately 5,000 endpoints.

"We need to give secure network access to each of our tenants, so we run separate virtual local area networks (LANs) for them. Nortel manages these networks remotely and ensures they are secure at all times," said S Francis Rajan, head-ICT, BIAL. "The network design ensures that all the different tenants at BIAL are isolated and secure from each other, even though they share the same physical infrastructure."