All Nippon Airways has transformed its digital infrastructure using Equinix Fabric, creating a centralized cloud network hub designed to support reservations, boarding, customer communications, and other operational systems.
ANA says the new architecture has reduced network provisioning time by approximately 80%, cutting deployment from months to weeks. The airline is also preparing for a projected tenfold increase in global data volumes and is targeting a 30% reduction in total cost of ownership over five years.
Moving to a more flexible network architecture
ANA operates approximately 280 aircraft across more than 200 domestic and international routes. Its digital infrastructure supports mission-critical services ranging from passenger reservations and boarding to customer communications and airline operations.
As the company expanded its use of hybrid and multicloud environments, its traditional network architecture became increasingly complex. Dedicated circuits for individual systems made it more difficult and costly to add new connections as requirements changed.
To address this, ANA redesigned its network around a centralized cloud network hub powered by Equinix Fabric.
“Our rapid business expansion demanded a network with unprecedented flexibility,” said Jun Nakazato, manager of the IT infrastructure team, digital governance department, digital transformation division at All Nippon Airways.
“Rather than continuing to expand our existing network environment, we recognized that implementing network-as-a-service was the most effective path forward. Equinix Fabric delivers the dynamic foundation we need to scale seamlessly,” he added.
Connecting directly to major cloud platforms
Equinix Fabric is a software-defined interconnection platform that enables ANA to establish secure, on-demand connections to cloud service providers without deploying separate physical circuits for every connection.
The platform supports connectivity to Amazon Web Services, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud, giving ANA a centralized way to manage access across multiple cloud environments.
By moving from traditionally provisioned network infrastructure to a software-defined model, ANA can deploy connectivity more quickly and scale it according to changing business requirements.
Supporting passenger services and future AI workloads
The cloud network hub is intended to support more integrated customer services, faster application deployment, and real-time operational coordination.
ANA also sees the architecture as a foundation for advanced analytics, automation, emerging AI workloads, and future digital services. Faster provisioning allows development teams to gain access to infrastructure sooner, supporting application testing and deployment.
Equinix says private connectivity and centralized policy enforcement can also help ANA address security and compliance requirements across its cloud environments.
Reducing provisioning time and long-term costs
ANA reports that the new network model has reduced network provisioning time by around 80%. This allows infrastructure resources to become available more quickly for application development and testing.
The airline is also targeting a 30% reduction in five-year total cost of ownership, although the release does not provide a detailed breakdown of the baseline costs or savings assumptions behind that target.
“ANA’s deployment of Equinix Fabric demonstrates what’s possible when enterprises evolve how they consume infrastructure, not by ripping and replacing, but by adding intelligence and flexibility on top of a resilient physical infrastructure,” said Kuniko Ogawa, managing director for Japan at Equinix.
“We’re proud to support ANA as it builds a digital foundation capable of handling tomorrow’s data demands while delivering better experiences for passengers today,” she added.
In Summary
All Nippon Airways has deployed Equinix Fabric to create a centralized cloud network hub connecting its systems to AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud. ANA says the architecture has cut network provisioning time by approximately 80%, is designed for a projected tenfold increase in data volumes, and supports its goal of reducing five-year total cost of ownership by 30%.