News
Rosenberger OSI installs future-proof cabling infrastructure in Europe’s second largest aquarium in Genoa
July 2023 by Marc Jacob
Rosenberger Optical Solutions & Infrastructure (Rosenberger OSI) has successfully completed a recent fiber project for Costa Edutainment, Italy’s leading operator of public and private leisure facilities. The project consisted of integrating the newly built "Città dei Bambini e dei Ragazzi" adventure museum into the existing fiber optic distribution infrastructure of the Genoa Aquarium.
Costa Edutainment operates a total of 12 facilities, including the Aquarium in Genoa, the second largest aquarium in Europe, as well as the "Biosfera" botanical garden designed by star architect Renzo Piano, the "Bigo" panoramic lift and the newly opened science museum for children and young people between the ages of 2 and 12, where Rosenberger OSI implemented the latest cabling project. The company’s other facilities include the aquariums in Livorno and in the seaside resort of Cattolica, the "Oltremare" edutainment park and the "Aquafan" water park in Riccione on the Italian Adriatic, the "Italia in Miniatura" theme park in Rimini, and the "Mediterraneo" marine park, one of the biggest tourist attractions in Malta.
10G backbone and OM4 technology for the existing structure
Costa Edutainment’s requirement was to integrate the "La Città dei Bambini e dei Ragazzi" facility, built on the first floor of the Genoa Aquarium, with the existing fiber distribution infrastructure. Most of the existing cabling in the building was installed between 1992 and 1996 with OM1 multimode fiber links.
To implement the new structure, OM4 links were selected and integrated into the existing backbones in the building. Therefore, the IT infrastructure between the data center and the floor cabinets in the Aquarium building was upgraded with the PreCONNECT® SMAP-G2 OM4 pre-terminated solution from Rosenberger OSI. This solution enabled an extremely fast organization of the routing, installation in the racks and commissioning (plug & play). The new solution includes OM4 10G links with LC Compact connectors and patch panels with a density of 96 fibers per unit. Owing to factory pre-terminated cables from Rosenberger OSI, replacing the links from the old to the new solution took only about 30 minutes.
Future-proof solution for further implementations
The current solution offers improved performance of the optical link compared to the previous one and allows for future advancements of the current 10G link. The solution will also be implemented in other Costa Edutainment parks. “Thanks to Rosenberger OSI, we were able to analyze the challenges, implement a modernization project, apply the required products, and get them up and running extremely quickly,” concludes Filippo Costa, ICT Corporate Advisor at Costa Edutainment.
