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Continuation of ARCS Services after 30 June 2011


3 June 2011

Australian Research Collaboration Service
Australian Research Collaboration Service

ARCS is pleased to announce that its popular video collaboration, data fabric and compute cloud services will continue uninterrupted after the end of the ARCS funding period on 30 June 2011.   The regional eResearch service providers are together continuing operations with QCIF responsible for video collaboration, iVEC for the data services and VPAC for the compute cloud and IdP.   The new operators will be assisted by eResearch SA, Intersect and TPAC. The services will serve you through the same ARCS Services website and provide support through the same customer service desk as now. The change has been designed to be completely seamless to you, the user, with these services smoothly continuing unchanged.  

The Australian Research Collaboration Services (ARCS) will complete its program of infrastructure development work funded through NCRIS Platforms for Collaboration on 30th June this year.  The services that ARCS developed, deployed and operated nationally for researchers are an important foundation to support research. We currently have approximately 3,500 researchers subscribing to the various services and more than 100 new users per month taking up one or more of the services.

ARCS is pleased to announce that the Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research (DIISR) and ARCS have arranged for the ARCS core services to continue to be provided and operated nationally by highly experienced and capable regional eResearch service providers. The ARCS core national services that are continuing are:

  • Grid & Compute Cloud and ARCS Identity Provider - operated by the Victorian Partnership for Advanced Computing (VPAC)
  • Data Services, including the ARCS Data Fabric, and the ARCS Access Service - operated by iVEC
  • Video collaboration (EVO for desktop and Access Grid for room-based) - operated by the Queensland Cyber Infrastructure Foundation (QCIF).

The new operators will be assisted by eResearch SA, Intersect and the Tasmanian Partnership for Advanced Computing (TPAC). The transition will be seamless to users and the new operators of the services will interact with users through a single website and customer service desk as now: www.arcs.org.au and 1800-TOARCS (1800-862727). More details can be found in the attached ARCS newsletter.

The operation and future development of the services will be guided and stimulated through close engagement between the research community and the new operators.

ARCS would like to thank you and your organisation for all your support over the last four years and would appreciate your continued support to the new operators as they develop and operate the services in to the future. 

Tony Williams  (ARCS Executive Director) 

Key contacts after 30 June 2011:

For information on these services and how to connect to them now and into the future, contact Customer Service at 1800-TOARCS (1800-862727) or customerservice@arcs.org.au;

For information about service management & future development contact: