Helen FosterCEO

Introduction• Who and where

• What we did

• Why we did it

• What worked – What didn’t work

• Why replicate it – How to replicate it

West Midlands, England

Poor, sparserural areas

Dense urban areas

Commuterrural areas

Decayingindustries

What we did• Regional part of four national pictures:

– Regional schools brought together– Colleges (Further and Adult Education) interlinked– University to University – Nationally to NREN/ National Education Network– Local and Central Government interconnection

• Unique in the UK– Some regional networks for schools– All regions have university networks– Most colleges connected via a university– None have Local Council traffic carried on network

• Only the WM has them all working together

What we did• Region wide public sector network

– 14 Councils plus 24 District Councils– 5.5 million population, aged below national average– 1 million plus learners– 0.5 million public sector employees

• High speed broadband backbone, 1G going to 2.5G– MPLS, QoS enabled– Diverse core ring, spur structure to most sites– Technically straightforward

• Connection to National Education Network– SuperJanet, hence to Geant

• Also connections to Health and Secure Gov’t sevices• Managed network, Cisco powered

– Bought by the public sector– Not built by the public sector

Schematic last month!

TW BromsgroveCisco 7304

KeeleCisco 6509

TW Wolverhampton

Cisco 6509

TW TelfordCisco 6509

StaffordCisco 6509

TW HUB3 (Birmingham)Cisco 6509

University of BirminghamCisco 6509

Worcestershire County Council

Cisco 6509

Warwick University

Cisco 6509

Stoke City Council

Cisco 7304

Stafford County Council

Cisco 7304

Wolverhampton City CouncilCisco 7304

Dudley Metropolitan

Borough CouncilCisco 7304

Wolverhampton University

Cisco 7304

Shropshire County Council

Cisco 7304

Shrewsbury 6th Form CollegeCisco 2691

Telford & Wrekin Council

Cisco 7304

Telford CATCisco 2691

Worcestershire County Council

Cisco 7304

Herefordshire County Council

Cisco 7304

Hereford Tech. College

Cisco 2691

Hereford 6th Form CollegeCisco 2691

Hereford Art & Design College

Cisco 2691

RNCB HerefordCisco 2691

Wolverhampton AES

Cisco 2691

Walsall Metropolitan

Borough CouncilCisco 7304

Solihull Metropolitan

Borough CouncilCisco 7304

Birmingham City Council

Cisco 7304

Sandwell Metropolitan

Borough CouncilCisco 7304

Newman CollegeCisco 7304

UCECisco 7304

AstonUniversity (1)Cisco 7304

AstonUniversity (2)Cisco 7304

100 Mbps

100 Mbps

Solihull CollegeCisco 2691

Sutton Coldfield College

Cisco 2691

Bournville CollegeCisco 2691

City College (Birmingham)Cisco 2691

Cadbury 6th Form College

Cisco 2691

Josiah Mason College

Cisco 2691

Sandwell CollegeCisco 2691

South BirminghamCisco 2691

Solihull 6th Form College

Cisco 2691

Fircroft Adult Ed.Cisco 2691

Joseph ChamberlainCisco 2691

Matthew Boulton College

Cisco 2691

10 Mbps

Walsall Art and Tech. College

Cisco 2691

University of BirminghamCisco 7304

Warwick University

Cisco 7304

Coventry University

Cisco 7304

Coventry City Council

Cisco 7304

Warwickshire County Council

Cisco 7304

Warwickshire College

Cisco 2691

Dudley CollegeCisco 2691

Halesowen College

Cisco 2691

City of Wolverhampton

CollegeCisco 2691

Walsall COCECisco 2691

10 Mbps

King Ed. 6th (Stourbridge)Cisco 2691

Stourbridge College

Cisco 2691

New College Telford

Cisco 2691

Pershore Group of CollegesCisco 2691

Evesham CollegeCisco 2691

10 Mbps

RNIB College Worcester Cisco 2691

Worcester Tech.College

Cisco 2691

Worcester 6th Form CollegeCisco 2691

Kidderminster College

Cisco 2691

NE Worcs. College

Cisco 2691

City College (Coventry)Cisco 2691

10 Mbps

Henley CollegeCisco 2691

Hereward CollegeCisco 2691

Stratford-u-AvonCollegeAlcatel

10 Mbps

King Ed. 6th (Nuneaton)

Alcatel

N Warks. & Hinckley College

Alcatel

Internet

SuperJANET

WolverhamptonTelford Campus

LinkVPN Tunnel

WolverhamptonCampus LinkVPN Tunnel

Local Authority

University

FE College

1 Gbps

100 Mbps

10 Mbps

VPN Tunnel

KeySite Identifer Link speed

B’ham College of Food Tourisim and Creative Studies

Switch Core

Local Authorities

Universities

FE Colleges

1 Wolverhampton

2 Walsall

3 Dudley

4 Sandwell

5 Birmingham

6 Solihull

7 Coventry

Stafford

Shrewsbury

Hereford

Worcester

Warwick

Stoke

Telford

2

34

5

1

67

The Partners Involved

• Regional Development Agency– Advantage West Midlands

• Universities– Birmingham, Warwick, UCE, Aston, Coventry,

Wolverhampton, Newman– supported by UKERNA

• Regional Broadband Consortium (WMnet)– Schools connectivity

• Later– Colleges, supported by Universities, UKERNA & LSC– Local Authorities

Why we did it - AWMAWM is the Regional Development Agency

“To create a better region in which to invest, work, learn, visit and live.”

• Skills Development: ICT skills to make the West Midlands workforce more competitive

• Retain the young people of the Region: where new ideas can thrive and hi-tech businesses can grow

• Market Stimulation: focusing demand, that in turn will make more services available to other customers

• Broker to start up * They get:– Initial capital funding - Board

representation– Start up staff - Grant deliverables

Why we did it – Universities and Colleges

• 54 sites spread widely across the region– History of co-operation– Connect onwards to SuperJanet– Very limited funding for colleges

• Regional network met these requirements– Outsourced the delivery, made it easy, commodity – Wide range of requirements, 4Mbs to 2.5Gb diverse

• Out-reach objective for all Universities– Engage with the community

• Represented on Board

Why we did it – Schools & Councils• 14 Councils and 2500 Schools• Central Government

– Set targets for bandwidth and timetable for connectivity– 2Mbs for 5-11 age group, min 8Mbs for senior schools– Each region must connect its schools together & to other regions– Limited national funding

• National solution was to use the NEN (SuperJanet)• Made sense for the local solution to work with those other

institutions that were also connecting to it– Money goes further– Share expertise– Access to resources, extended teaching unforeseen bonus

• Councils bought in alongside schools– now use new services

• Councils nominate Board Member• Central Gov’t has Board Member

Who did it - WMNC

• Need a central organisation– Independent of the different user groups– Find a middle way between the agenda of all involved– Owned by the regional Public Sector– Accountable to the region via Board Members

• WMNC acts as the contracting and managing company for all the users– Commercial Telecoms/Network professionals– Bringing the funds together – Delivering the service– ‘Not for profit’ maximises the efficiencies

WMNC FundingAdvantage

West Midlands

WMNC “not for profit”

Services delivered to public sector clients

Regional Development Grant

Invoice for services

WMLocal

Authorities

MidMAN

Payment for services

Connectivity,ISP, Hosting,etc

Payment to network & Service suppliers

-ve £’s

£’s £’s

LSC/UKERNA

What worked about the idea• Private sector like it

– Easier to negotiate for bigger contracts– More professional/expert on the client side

• Aggregate not replicate– Central Government like it– Brought together similar requirements from a similar sectors– Encouraged further sharing of services

• Webcasts between experts in Universities and schools

• Teacher training

– Created new opportunities• “Rock idol”, poetry competitions, paired schools (local, international)

• Education otherwise than at school

– Shared know-how eg.Firewalls, management systems

What didn’t work• Implied scrutiny scared some, needs tact

– ‘Outsiders’ challenging existing practices– Differing levels of expertise “showing us up” – Security means different things, particularly in schools

• Much slower to embed than expected– Working practices take a long time to change– Initial contract was too short

• Central government moved on too soon– Withdrew funding before 100% complete in schools

• National Audit Office - difficult to understand– Too many sources of funding

Why replicate it• More ‘bangs for bucks’

– Larger scale contract, economies of scale– Affordable scrutiny and professionalism– Skills transfer locally– Co-operation increases opportunities

• The Network is the beginning of the road– Cost effective services– Shared services– Joined up services– Better value for the institution and the citizen

• But be prepared for the long haul

How to replicate it• Needs a large capital injection

– To provide the “carrot” to get involved– To de-risk the proposition– European funding can be a source

• under social change, economic development, etc.

• Bringing together diverse sources of funding– Individually always insufficient– Always different targets, timetables, deliverables– One organisation to ‘smooth’ them together

• Central team must be– Independent of all user groups– Professional network / telecoms people– Not just administrators

What are we going to do next?• Now delivery is quick, reliable and robust …• More services

– Over and above just bandwidth– For all of education

• Add services• Add delivery organisations

– Looking for the ‘Value Add’ for the Public Sector• Health, Emergency Service, Civil co-operation

– Quasi-Public Sector eg. Charities, Arts, Voluntary

• Central Government agenda in all areas– Easier to deliver– Faster and cheaper

• Improve resiliance and flexibility

Conclusions• There are more benefits than you would anticipate• Must be aware of customers

– Appropriate control and transparency– Understand the political considerations– Understand how the money works– Public Sector = one of us, in the family

• More people are keen to join up and make it work than will feel threatened – but some will– Can include existing national instituations as well as local

• Private sector prefers to deal with one focused organisation– Gives a better deal and better service

• It takes time and patience– But it’s worth it!

Unique co-operation,Joined up,

Delivering ValueFor the West

Midlandswww.wmnc.org.uk