In May 2020, GÉANT signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with CSTNET, the China Science and Technology Network, which provides dedicated connectivity and services for Chinese science and technology institutions and their communities. CSTNET also operates the China Science and Technology Cloud (CSTCloud), a national platform to provide scientists with integrated cloud solutions.
The agreement renews the parties’ longstanding relationship. In fact, in 2018 GÉANT and CSTNET signed a previous MoU with the intent to boost EU-China connectivity and in 2019 this resulted in a jointly tendered and 50:50 funded 10G low-latency terrestrial link, contracted for two years. The capacity boost complemented the existing 10G London-Beijing circuit jointly contracted by GÉANT and the second Chinese NREN CERNET since 2015, and followed the successful completion of the EU-China funded ORIENTplus project which had established the first direct connection between Europe and China with CERNET and CSTNET.
Through the new MoU the parties renew their commitment to continuing joint EU-China connectivity provision beyond 2021 which will include exploring the possibility of further capacity upgrades.
The MoU also focuses on identifying new cooperation opportunities in the context of the European Open Science Cloud (EOSC) initiative and CSTCloud, such as sharing available information and experiences in the areas of governance, operation, and sustainability plans.
GÉANT and CSTNET have also agreed to jointly work on identifying, engaging with and supporting user communities – such as the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) project, the EBI-BGI genomics collaboration , the Jiangmen Underground Neutrino Observatory (JUNO) experiment – to name but a few.
Erik Huizer, GÉANT CEO | At the heart of our partnership with CSTNET lies our shared mission to boost scientific collaborations between our regions. Bandwidth-hungry projects, such as SKA, the JUNO experiment and data processing for the Vera Rubin Observatory (VRO) rely on resilient high-capacity connectivity. Together with our Chinese partners we are committed to securing it and look forward to also joining forces in providing dedicated support to our user communities.
Fangyu Liao, CNIC CAS, Director General| We are pleased to further develop our relationship with our long-term partner GÉANT and are particularly excited to explore collaboration opportunities between EOSC and CSTCloud to optimise the sharing and access of scientific data between our regions. More scientific and technological elements are interconnected by the high-performance network link to facilitate the innovation cooperation driven by big data and AI.
About GÉANT
GÉANT is Europe’s leading collaboration on network and related infrastructure and services for the benefit of research and education, contributing to Europe’s economic growth and competitiveness. The organisation develops, delivers and promotes advanced network and associated e-infrastructure services, and supports innovation and knowledge-sharing amongst its members, partners and the wider research and education networking community.
For more information, visit www.geant.org
About CSTNET
CSTNET (China Science and Technology Network) is operated by CNIC(Computer Network Information Center, CAS)，It originated in 1989 from the National Computing and Networking Facility of China (NCFC) and developed from the network of Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS). Today, CSTNET covers 30 provinces, cities and autonomous regions across China via 13 regional sub-centers, connecting over 1 million researchers and scholars at more than 370 institutions in CAS as well as other national organisations such as China Meteorological Administration, China Academy of Forestry, China Earthquake Administration, China Academy of Agricultural Sciences.
For more information, visit http://english.cnic.cas.cn
