Juniper Upgrades US Air Force Network Along Open Standards

The United States Air Force is to modernise its network infrastructure using open networking standards, claiming it will offer scale and flexibility to the organisation while offering improved performance to the 800,000 users who rely on the critical communications it powers.

Juniper Networks has won four contracts put up for tender by the Air Force and has already started the network refresh at 44 bases around the world as part of the Base information Transport Infrastructure (BITI) programme.

Juniper Networks Air Force

The company will refresh the core, distribution and critical access nodes and provide enhanced network management, making it easier to automate processes, provide user access and scale according to data and voice demands.

Juniper’s switches make use of open standards, providing the Air Force with a greater choice of equipment manufacturers, and the technology will streamline IT operations for administrators.

It is expected that the network upgrade will be completed by September 2016.

“The Air Force’s network modernisation program and support for open and interoperable technologies will pay long-term dividends for its secure network,” said Bob Fortna, vice president of federal defence at Juniper Networks. “This award validates Juniper Networks’ products as innovative solutions that government agencies and our prime contracting partners can rely on for their most critical use cases.”

Last year Juniper teamed up with wireless specialist Ruckus Wireless to provide customers with integrated systems for customers. However it has come under fire in recent times after discovering a backdoor in its firewall kit and had to issue a patch to remove flawed encryption code