2005

NTT Com Adds Jitter SLA for Global IP Network Services

Tokyo, JAPAN

March 29, 2005

NTT Com announced that it will offer an industry-leading "jitter" service level agreement (SLA) for its Transit and Collocation Transit service customers on its global Tier 1* network. The new SLA improves its threshold of monthly average round-trip packet transmission (latency) for these services from 35 ms to 25 ms within Japan as well. NTT Com will also introduce the SLA for its Smart Content Delivery to guarantee 100% availability. The new terms will go into effect from April 1, 2005.

Jitter is the variation in delay for packet transfers between selected POPs. It is caused by network congestion, timing drift, or route changes and affects quality for time-sensitive applications such as video conferences and Voice over IP (VoIP). The addition of jitter SLA reflects market demand for high quality real-time communications services.

NTT Com's goal is to keep average monthly jitter at 0.5 ms or less and to have the maximum level not exceed 10 ms for more than 0.1% of service time in a calendar month. The new jitter standard covers communications in seven regions: intra-Japan, intra-Asia, intra-U.S., intra-Europe, trans-Atlantic, Japan-U.S, and Japan-Europe. If jitter exceeds the limit in a calendar month, 1/30th of the monthly charges will be refunded.

The 100% availability of the Smart Content Delivery will result in stable content delivery networks for Internet businesses and high quality, large-volume content distribution. In the event that service on its network is completely disrupted due to circumstances caused by NTT Com, 1/30th of the monthly charges will be refunded.

* Tier 1
Tier 1 is an ISP group that can control its own network and does not depend on an upper provider to maintain quality. NTT Com Global IP Network is one of the world's largest IP backbone transmitting 27 Gbps between Japan and the U.S. and 25 Gbps between Asia and Oceania.