NTT Com to deploy IOWN All Photonics Network in remote musical collaboration involving thousands in three locations in Japan on Dec. 4

NTT Communications Corporation (NTT Com), the ICT solutions and international communications business within the NTT group, announced today that in collaboration with Nippon Telegraph and Telephone West Corporation (NTT West) and Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT), it will deploy its advanced All Photonics Network (APN), which is being developed under NTT’s IOWN initiative,¹ to connect thousands of musicians in three locations in real-time for a remote musical collaboration. The occasion will be the 40th performance of “SUNTORY Presents Beethoven’s 9th with a Cast of 10,000,” held annually at Osaka-jo (castle) since 1983, which will be hosted by Mainichi Broadcasting System, Inc. from 3:00pm on Sunday, December 4.

In the remote collaborative performance, choirs in Osaka-jo Hall, NTT Com’s OPEN HUB Park in Tokyo and NTT West’s QUINTBRIDGE in Osaka, which are separated by a cumulative distance of some 700 km in terms of optical fiber length, will be linked together via the APN to sing together as one unified choir accompanied by their respective conductors and an orchestra.

The undertaking will demonstrate four key technologies of NTT’s ultra-advanced APN communications network: 1) high-capacity, low-latency and low-fluctuation communication technology, which is vastly superior to conventional best-effort networks; 2) latency visualization technology for microsecond delay measurement and visualization; 3) low-latency video-transmission technology² using the MediaRouterX³ 4K/8K uncompressed-video optical-transmission device; and 4) low-latency video-processing technology⁴ for splitting and displaying multiple images from separate locations.

For the demonstration, NTT Com will provide use of OPEN HUB Park, an IOWN APN demonstration environment, as one of the remote venues. NTT West will provide use of the main venue, Osaka-jo Hall, as well as the other remote venue, QUINTBRIDGE, and also will conduct technical verifications and evaluations. NTT will handle fundamental technical verifications of the four core technologies mentioned above.

Going forward, NTT Com will utilize learnings from this demonstration to develop other scenarios for deploying IOWN APN technologies being developed by the NTT group.

In response to COVID-19’s impact on changing lifestyles, the live entertainment industry is seeking new ways to fuse real and online events, such as audience-free live performances and virtual festivals. NTT Com is developing solutions in fields including live entertainment using IOWN APN and related technologies to deliver exceptional user experiences based on the NTT group’s IOWN (Innovative Optical and Wireless Network) initiative.

NTT DOCOMO, NTT Com and NTT COMWARE have integrated their enterprise businesses under the new DOCOMO group and its “docomo business” brand. The group, guided by its Mobile Cloud First strategy, strives to deliver innovative solutions for society and industry through collaboration with enterprise clients and partners under the slogan “Changing worlds with you.”