CSC, SURF and Nokia Achieve 1.2 Tbit/s Data Transfer to prepare long haul network for new LUMI-AI supercomputer and AI Factories

Press Release
CSC, SURF and Nokia Achieve 1.2 Tbit/s Data Transfer to prepare long haul network for new LUMI-AI supercomputer and AI Factories

• Trial helps researchers prepare network for high performance computing (HPC) clusters and AI Factories handling massive datasets and high-intensity workloads.
• Results confirm that multi-domain, high-capacity data transfers across European research networks are both feasible and future-ready.

4 June 2025
Espoo, Finland – Nokia, CSC – IT Center for Science and SURF have successfully tested a high-capacity, quantum-safe fibre-optic connection exceeding 1.2 terabit per second (Tbit/s) between Amsterdam, the Netherlands and Kajaani, Finland with data traversing over 3500 kilometers. The trial, which was conducted in May 2025, demonstrated the potential of ultra-fast, cross-border connectivity for research.

Tests were carried out along several routes, including the longest which spanned 4,700 km through Norway at a capacity of 1Tbit/s. To put this in perspective, 1 Tbit/s is enough to stream 200,000 full HD movies (at 5 Mbit/s each) simultaneously. 

These results are particularly promising as the research community prepares for supercomputers and AI Factories to come online – where reliable, scalable, and secure connections will be critical to supporting some of the world's largest datasets and most demanding workloads.

The test used a combination of real research data and synthetic data, transferred directly from disk to disk – from SURF’s facility in Amsterdam to CSC’s data center in Kajaani, across five production research and education networks: SURF (the Netherlands), NORDUnet (Nordic backbone), Sunet (Sweden), SIKT (Norway) and Funet (CSC’s network in Finland).

The network solution was based on Nokia’s IP/MPLS routing and quantum-safe optical networking gear. Nokia’s IP technology successfully demonstrated Flexible Ethernet (FlexE) to accommodate “elephant flows”, or very large continuous flows of data, and its high-capacity optical transport technology showed the ability to handle massive data sets generated by HPCs over long distances.

With the exponential growth of research data, especially for training large-scale AI models, the need for resilient, high-throughput and secure connectivity is more critical than ever. This test confirms that multi-domain, high-capacity data transfers across European research networks are both feasible and future-ready. Testing an operational network connection over long distances provides unique insights into data transport and storage of large data volumes. The tests are crucial for improving the infrastructure for data-intensive research.