R&M is implementing network cabling for the new Istanbul Airport, the largest airport in the world, for IGA. Here we ask Suleyman Tokmak, Managing Director, R&M Turkey, questions about the project.
Can you share details about the new Istanbul Airport and R&M’s involvement in this project?
Istanbul New Airport will be constructed over an area of 76.5 million square metres to the north of Istanbul and will be completed in four phases. The first phase will be finalised in 2018 with the opening of two runways and a terminal with a 90 million passenger capacity. Once complete, the new airport will host flights to more than 350 destinations with an annual passenger capacity of up to 200 million.
On completion of all four phases, Istanbul New Airport will have six active runways, 250 aircraft slots and parking facilities for 25,000 cars. Thus, Istanbul will continue to be a major hub at the intersection of Asia, Europe and the Middle East.
R&M is a major technology partner in enabling digital connectivity for systems at this new airport. The R&M high-density fibre platform, Netscale, the automated infrastructure management solution, R&MinteliPhy, and the 5U ODF (Optical Distribution Frame) are at the core of the airport’s communications platform.
The cabling system is designed for a lifetime of 25 years with unconditional reliability. R&M is confident in the unmatched Swiss product quality and is offering its 25-year R&Mfreenet systems warranty on the cabling infrastructure.
For the first phase, R&M has supplied a total length of 4,500km of copper and over 1,600km of fibre-optic cables. Additionally, around 90,000 RJ45 ports have been provisioned. This network connects and supports key airport systems.
Each of the systems has required customisation of the cabling, including specific colour coding. R&M was chosen as a partner for this project because it demonstrated extensive expertise in large-scale projects for the aviation sector.
What innovative products, solutions and services has the airport deployed?
R&M’s current scope of the project consists of supplying materials to implement the cabling infrastructure. This includes:
- LAN Cabling for the airport buildings for all the ICT systems
- Entire airport campus building backbone cabling and distribution as part of the outside plant
- The two data centres of the airport facilities
The project involves various network systems such as ICT, security, and police and customs networks, each requiring customisation. IGA’s Datacenter Infrastructure is designed with R&M’s latest and most innovative products including Netscale, the world’s highest fibre port density for 10/40/100G Ethernet and R&MinteliPhy, the automated infrastructure management system.
For an airport of this scale, what were the unique cabling requirements and how did R&M deliver on these?
Airport network connectivity needs high availability, security and density.
R&M’s Netscale Solution combines unmatched fibre cable management with automated connectivity tracking by R&MinteliPhy. The R&MinteliPhy system offers real-time physical connectivity monitoring of the network, enabling the airport infrastructure manager to have full control over the physical network during the operation in real time.
With R&MinteliPhy, data centres optimise their management and their infrastructure processes. The system records and monitors the network configuration centrally and in real time, resulting in greater transparency, more efficient management of quality and risks, improved compliance and successful audits.
R&M products provide modularity and flexibility for changes at any time in the future. Seamless upgrade of network, capacity and cost effictiveness were some of the main criteria for the project team in choosing R&M solution for this project.
R&M also provided special on-site training and support services ensuring the correct handling and installation of products as per quality guidelines and industry standard best practices. R&M understood the needs of the customer and customised the solutions based on the customer’s request. This solution resulted in greater availability, security, modularity, flexibility and customisation, while ensuring cost-effectiveness as well.
What are your expectations about this airport project for the midterm as a reflection to your new projects? What are the advantages it can bring to you, especially for your international projects?
R&M has benefited from its participation on this unique project. R&M dedicated additional effort to adapt and be flexible in supporting changing project requirements and scope of the project in terms of material. New technologies like Netscale (released during the execution of the project) were swiftly and seamlessly integrated into the project. Delivery planning together with project progress requirement required a great amount of coordination with different contractors.
Some of the challenges overcome included the continous training of the installation teams on both fibre and copper technologies. Having dedicated resources at IGA ensured coordination with material planning, delivery and on-site support activities. The project management team assisted in proactively identifying challenges, providing solutions and taking the project to a successful completion.R&M provided a dedicated engineer to support on a daily basis in material planning and on-site support activities.
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