We want to provide you another update on the NET+ Zoom program, Zoom-Internet2 network peering and remind you about some community resources that are available.

As a reminder, you can view previous updates related to the NET+ Zoom offering and Internet2-Zoom network peering on our wiki.

Community Resources 

The NET+ Zoom Service Advisory board has set up a Slack channel for higher education collaboration and discussion related to Zoom. We’d encourage you to join via this link and interact with other colleagues.

Working with the Service Advisory Board, we’ve also set up a community survey to ensure we are working with Zoom on the most important issues for higher education as a way of determining next steps to support the community. Please consider taking the survey today. We are also working to set up a town hall in the coming weeks for the community to discuss key issues and share best practices and lessons learned.

Network Peering

Over the past week, we’ve increased our capacity to Zoom by almost tenfold and are actively working with home broadband providers to assure VPN traffic has a high-performance path from the home to the campus as it continues to grow. Network utilization of Zoom peerings is actually down as Zoom appears to have moved many of its compute operations to AWS and other cloud compute resources. You can read more about how R&E Networks are supporting the academic enterprise in unprecedented times here.

Additional NET+ Zoom Updates and Reminders

Due to the increase in demand, Zoom will take about 48hrs to provision services to your account, once they’ve received a signed Order form. To help expedite the processing, please:

  • Consolidate your orders, as much as possible. Quotes and order forms are processed in the order it was received. Grouping your orders together will help lessen any confusions or errors. 
  • Provide the following information when asking for a quote:
    • Item Name (i.e. Webinar 500 Participants)
    • Quantity of item
    • Effective Date
    • Contact Information - Name and Email of who needs to sign the quote/order form

Please ensure upgrade and new orders are being sent to your Zoom account manager and netplus@internet2.edu. 

We understand this is a challenging time for everyone and we’re so appreciative of the community partnering with us as we navigate through this historic time. Please let us know if there’s anything we can do further to help.