Warwick Uni signs £1.2m DiData deal

Nice to know UK universities still have some money to go around...

Dimension Data has agreed a £1.2m deal with Warwick University which will see it design and install cabling to connect 12 buildings around the campus of the Midlands university. Dimension Data beat off competition from six other companies for the contract and will now begin to plan for the installation of Nordx/CDT Category-6 cabling and fibre optic backbone infrastructure, which will link key campus buildings including the university’s science blocks and engineering faculties. The deal is in part a necessary replacement of existing, outdated infrastructure intended to meet a need for increased bandwidth across the campus. However, future modernisation may not need to be so wholesale. The facility to cater for future change in the needs of the university has been built in to this roll out, with the Uni claiming its new cabling is 'future proof'. Richard McKenna, project manager for University of Warwick IT Services said: “This is a very important project for the university. Any new structured cabling has to be both reliable and future proof to accommodate a wide range of teaching and research activities spanning all disciplines." The roll-out of the new infrastructure is due to be completed in September 2003 in time for the beginning of the new academic year. This scheme is the first phase in an over-arching plan to update infrastructure across 90 university buildings.