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The Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California (CENIC) is a nonprofit corporation formed in 1996 to provide high-performance, high-bandwidth networking services to California universities and research institutions. Through this corporation, representatives from the University of California system, the California State University system, the California Community College system, California's K-12 schools, and private universities including the California Institute of Technology, Stanford University, and the University of Southern California combine their networking resources toward the operation, deployment, and maintenance of the California Research and Education Network, or CalREN. Other participants include the Nevada System of Higher Education, the University of Arizona, Arizona State University, the Naval Postgraduate School, the NASA Ames Research Center, the University of San Francisco, and the the University of San Diego.

The CalREN Optical Backbone

CalREN is a three-tiered network consisting of a statewide optical backbone to which schools and other institutions in California connect at Gigabit speeds via leased circuits obtained from telecom carriers or fiber-optic cable. These tiers include:

• CalREN-DC (Digital California): This tier includes services for all K-20 California research and education users.
• CalREN-HPR (High-Performance Research): This tier includes leading-edge services for large application users.
• CalREN-XD (Experimental and Developmental): This tier includes bleeding-edge services for network researchers.

All three network tiers operate independently.

CENIC also engages in networking peering relationships, in particular Pacific Wave (a joint project between CENIC and the Pacific Northwest Gigapop, the University of Southern California, and the University of Washington), which provides peering facilities along the Pacific coast of the United States. Pacific Wave participants include networks in Australia, Canada, Japan, Korea, Qatar, Taiwan, Singapore, and the United States.

CalREN also connects at Gigabit speeds to Internet2, National LambdaRail, CUDI (the Corporación Universitaria para el Desarrollo de Internet), the Mexican high-bandwidth research and education network, redCLARA (the Cooperación Latino-Americana de Redes Avanzadas), and CAnet4 (the Canadian optical research and education network, managed by CANARIE).

CalREN was expanded by funding through the state of California and its Digital California Project to include K-12 public education. When funding sources changed, the K-12 portion became the K-12 High Speed Network (K12HSN), which continues to contract through CENIC.

• cenic.org
• pacificwave.net
• CUDI.edu.mx
• NLR.net
• K12HSN.org