Case Study: Arqiva achieves All‑IP transition, increased capacity and OPEX savings with Arista Networks

Arqiva selects Arista for innovative transition to an All‐IP communication infrastructure

Arqiva, a leading UK communications infrastructure provider serving 98.5% of the population from 16,000 sites, is migrating its legacy co‑axial SDI/ASI baseband systems to an All‑IP, software‑defined architecture to support new commercial models and higher‑resolution services. The challenge was to replace deterministic, low‑latency broadcast interfaces with an IP network that can deliver very high bandwidth, low latency and predictable behaviour for uncompressed SD to UHD media while adopting emerging standards like SMPTE ST 2110 and AMWA NMOS.

Arqiva selected Arista (7280 series, 7280SR/7508R switches and EOS) to provide a high‑performance, SDN‑based IP fabric. The Arista platform’s wire‑speed forwarding, deep buffers, multicast capabilities and EOS/EAPI orchestration integration allowed dynamic scheduling and optimized multicast workflows; initial phases have increased capacity, cut OPEX and delivered a highly scalable, flexible foundation for UHD, OTT and future IP‑centric services.

Arqiva

Kenelm Deen

Senior Product Manager, Terrestrial Broadcast