NTT Communications Takes AFP into the Digital Era

Paris (ots/PRNewswire) -

NTT Communications, a member of the NTT Group and the number one
Fortune Global 500 telecommunications group, has been a loyal
supplier since 1998 to Agence France-Presse (AFP), a global news
agency delivering fast, worldwide news. Through its ability to
deliver a quality and responsive service, NTT Communications has
consistently been able to meet the demands of AFP's increased flow of
multimedia-rich content through its low-latency, high speed network.

Jean-Pierre Scagnelli, Infrastructure and Engineering Manager at
AFP, explains the reasons for choosing and staying with NTT
Communications, "The evolution of multimedia rich content has
generated an increasingly high flow of traffic for us. NTT
Communications guarantees us commitment, quality and support. They
fully meet our expectations and really stand out from their
competitors with a professional approach at all times."

AFP's core business has evolved over the last few years to allow
for and incorporate the growing need of images and videos of its
customers onto the AFP network. AFP now holds a database of over 8
million archival photographs and more than 2,000 are being created
every day. There are also 30 production units in France and around
the world which make around 500 news videos every month. An
infrastructure that ensures a sufficient flow rate and high
availability is a key requirement; multimedia takes up a lot of
bandwidth and needs to stream through the network. NTT Communications
understands this and provides a responsive network to ensure AFP can
run its business and pass data effortlessly between the various sites
in Asia.

NTT Communications connects AFP to its Asian network hub in Hong
Kong, which gives high speed connection to its US offices. NTT has
also introduced an Ethernet interconnect solution from its sites to
the central site based in Hong Kong. AFP wanted to keep with a single
routing solution so NTT Communications developed its network to allow
it to maintain a balanced flow and to keep up with the exponential
growth in multimedia.

Each year, AFP reviews its contract to ensure best performance on
the network and to compare it against its competitors to help control
costs. AFP remain happy that NTT Communications' services are being
provided at a fair and competitive rate and has always renewed its
contract.

Along with providing the network, NTT Communications is
frequently called upon to assist AFP in a range of projects; IP
telephony, equipment replacement and the installation of WiFi in
offices. Video in particular has become increasingly more important
in the last three years and will continue to grow and demand high
connectivity rates in the coming years.

"We have access to service teams in Paris on a 24/7 basis and
on-site technicians are available to our Asian offices during the
implementation of new solution techniques." Scagnelli continues
talking about the collaboration over the years, "We appreciate the
professionalism of NTT Communications and quality of network service
and we look forward to working on future projects with NTT on the
African continent."

Olivier Micheli, Country Manager of NTT Europe in France says,
"We are pleased and proud to continue providing high performing
network and security services to AFP, knowing that we contribute to
the transfer of information on worldwide, current events as they
happen."

Editors Notes: This is a translation from a French press release.

About NTT Communications Corporation

NTT Communications provides consultancy, architecture, security
and cloud services to optimize the information and communications
technology (ICT) environments of enterprises. These offerings are
backed by the company's worldwide infrastructure, including leading
global tier-1 IP network, Arcstar Universal One(TM) VPN network
reaching over 150 countries, and over 130 secure data centers. NTT
Communications' solutions leverage the global resources of NTT Group
companies including Dimension Data, NTT DOCOMO and NTT DATA.

For further information, please visit:

http://www.ntt.com | http://www.twitter.com/nttcom |
http://www.facebook.com/nttcomtv

About AFP

AFP is a global news agency delivering fast, accurate and
complete video, text, photo, multimedia and graphics on events that
make international news. From wars and conflicts to politics, sports,
entertainment and major developments in health, science and
technology. Its 2,260 employees from 80 different nationalities in
150 countries and in six languages ??walk the planet, 24 hours a day,
365 days a year to bring news to you.

For further information, please visit:

http://www.afp.com/en

For media enquiries, please contact:
Loic Bertin
Director of Marketing Alliances
+33-01-47-17-28-30 - +33-06-77-11.16-39
loic.bertin@ntt.eu
Emma Crowe (Media Enquiries)
Marketing Communications Manager - EMEA
NTT Communications
Emma.crowe@ntt.eu
+44(0)7581-315-241

ots Originaltext: NTT Communications Corporation
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