09 December 2014     

Telecom Italia and Telecom Italia Sparkle winners of the 2014 Metro Ethernet Forum Excellence Award

TI Group is 2014 Best CE 2.0 Wholesale E-Access Provider in the EMEA Region.

Telecom Italia and Telecom Italia Sparkle, the International Services arm of Telecom Italia Group, are the winners of the 2014 edition of the MEF (Metro Ethernet Forum) Excellence Award. The judging panel, composed of prominent senior analysts from IDC, Frost & Sullivan, Ovum Infonetics, Vertical Systems, Gartner and the Rayno Report among others, has selected Telecom Italia and Telecom Italia Sparkle as “Best CE 2.0 Wholesale E-Access Provider EMEA of the year”.

As MEF motivated the Award, “Telecom Italia and Telecom Italia Sparkle have been a leader and advocate for standardized Carrier Ethernet Access services in the European market. This award recognizes their leadership in providing Certified CE 2.0 E-Access services into Europe and extending these internationally via Telecom Italia Sparkle”. The winners were presented at the Ethernet Excellence Awards Gala Dinner last November 18 in Washington during the international MEF GEN14 Conference.

“The 2014 MEF Ethernet Excellence Award is an additional acknowledgment for the TI Group as pioneer in the introduction of a Carrier Ethernet Service proposition in line with the recent CE 2.0 MEF standards and it reinforces Telecom Italia Group’s leading positioning as global TLC connectivity, services and application provider” says Alessandro Talotta, Executive Officer of Telecom Italia National Wholesale Services. “Telecom Italia Group will continue to innovate its Carrier Ethernet services proposition in line with the extraordinary works led by MEF on LSO (Lifecycle Service Orchestration), SDN (Software Defined Networks), NFV (Network Function Virtualization) and Cloud connectivity”.

“We are now able to offer top quality end-to-end advanced Ethernet services to our customer base worldwide, and that adds tremendous value to TI Sparkle’s cutting edge international connectivity proposition, catering the sophisticated needs of the different players in the global Cloud ecosystem”, says Elisabetta Ripa, CEO TI Sparkle. 

This Award follows the EMEA 2.0 certification obtained in 2013 and 2014 by the TI Group, the first Service Provider in Europe to achieve this Certification. The Award also acknowledges Telecom Italia Lab relevant contribution to the innovation and engineering of Carrier Ethernet Networks and Services, in line with MEF advanced standards.

“We had an outstanding level of quality from the entries for this year’s new Ethernet Excellence Awards programs and we are pleased to formally recognize the innovation and leadership show by the TI Group,” said Nan Chen, President of the MEF. “We look forward to continuing this productive collaboration as we move forward to the new world of agile, assured and orchestrated services – what MEF is defining as the new Third Network.”

This prestigious Award recognizes service, technological, professional excellence and innovation in the global Carrier Ethernet community. Moreover, it acknowledges excellence on new services that provide scalability, service flexibility, top quality performance, virtualization, global reach and other features that are central for the delivery of Carrier Ethernet in 2014 and beyond.

About MEF
The MEF is the defining body and driving force behind the global market for Carrier Ethernet. MEF’s flagship work is CE 2.0, including specifications, operational frameworks, certification programs for services, equipment and professionals (MEF-CECP). An industry alliance consisting of more than 220 member organizations, the MEF operates through a powerful collaborative framework of service providers, network solutions suppliers to achieve its CE 2.0 development and globalization objectives. Building on thirteen years of success and widespread adoption of CE 2.0, MEF is now focused on defining LSO (Lifecycle Service Orchestration) with APIs for existing network, NFV and SDN implementations enabling Agile, Assured and Orchestrated Network as a Service.