Data center operator Equinix has placed a multi-million dollar order with networking vendor Ciena for metro networks switching equipment.

The order includes a Ciena 6500 system, the V-WAN network resource broker and scheduling applications.

The switching system runs at 100Gbps but Ciena has pledged it can upgrade to 400Gbps in the future.

Equinix said the equipment will provide the platform for building a multi-layer Software Defined Network (SDN) control.

The operator said it must evolve its data centers in preparation for a business environment in which services must be turned on and off at a much faster pace.

Increasingly Equinix customers are telling the data center operator that they plan to expand their networks globally, according to Equinix CTO Ihab Tarazi, who said that its clients are demanding faster connections between their IBX data centers.

“Through Ciena we can offer customers a dynamic and automated interface to the hundreds of network and cloud service providers inside our data centers,” said Tarazi.

Equinix said the Ciena switching gear will help its Cloud Exchange to automate interconnection between cloud, network and managed service providers.

Equinix wanted to ramp up its service orchestration, according to Tarazi, as it needed to be able to create private 1Gb and 10Gb connections to transfer data between its own infrastructure and multiple cloud providers.

In June Equinix announced plans to expand its Cloud Exchange from 13 markets to 19 global locations by the end of 2014. Cloud service provider GoGrid was added to the Cloud Exchange in a bid to boost its performance and speed the rate of cloud adoption.

Telco and data center operator Level 3 was added to the Cloud Exchange in May.