Shanghai Telecom will use new metro networking technology from Nortel to provide high-bandwidth, business-critical voice, data and video applications to its customers in Shanghai, China's largest city and major economic center.

Nortel's Metro Ethernet Networking solution will position Shanghai Telecom to reliably and cost-effectively offer premium network services such as next-generation network voice services, Ethernet VPN-based business continuity services and potential IPTV services to its enterprise customers and individual end users.

"Our new Metro Ethernet portfolio takes a tried-and-true technology workhorse - Ethernet - to a new level," said Jackson Wu, president, Greater China, Nortel. "It enables service providers like Shanghai Telecom to use Ethernet to dependably deliver any kind of high-speed, high-bandwidth video and data service over the same infrastructure - and this is a key market differentiator for Nortel."

Shanghai Telecom will be deploying Nortel's high-performance Metro Ethernet Routing Switch 8600 at the network core. At the network edge, Nortel's Ethernet Services Unit 1800 will provide the delivery point for Ethernet-based services.

Underpinning the Nortel Metro Ethernet Networking portfolio are new technologies - Provider Backbone Bridging (PBB) and Provider Backbone Transport (PBT) - designed to allow service providers to use Ethernet to deliver the communication and entertainment services of the future to consumers and companies across cities and countries. PBB and PBT, which are innovative technologies set to revolutionize metro networking, provide Ethernet with carrier-class levels of attributes such as reliability and scalability.

The Nortel Metro Ethernet Networks portfolio - which includes solutions for multiservice optical, carrier Ethernet and wireless backhaul - enables service providers to address the growth of high-bandwidth video and data applications in their metro networks.