Ciena Upgrades 5430 Platform for High-Speed OTN
The global, growing hunger for faster networks to power high bandwidth, on-demand networks and service providers is spurring sales of OTN switching technologies, a hunger Ciena hopes to feed with today's upgraded version of its 5430 Packet-Optical Platform.
Hybrid packet OTN technology is expanding, in part as service providers seek to improve network carrying capacity and data transmission speeds, wrote Babak Sammi, vice president of marketing and applications at PMC-Sierra, in a company blog. OTN effectively virtualizes optical bandwidth, enabling the system to dynamically assign network traffic types with 1G granularity over 100G optical pipes, he wrote.
"OTN switching delivers a cost-effective, scalable, low-latency layer to address the bandwidth scaling needed to deal with packet traffic growth," said Sammi. "In other words, it makes 100G an economical and reliable technology for mass deployment."
Indeed, more than 80 percent of service providers and network operators use OTN to meet the needs for scalable, wide area, long-haul communications, Fady Masoud, senior advisor, Technical Marketing at Ciena, told EnterpriseTech. When combined with a control plane, OTN switching automates daily operations and improves network resiliency and changes in network connectivity or rearrange connectivity in response, for example, to increased latency in a network's critical spans, he said.
Ciena Upgrade
The latest iteration of the Ciena 5430 features up to five times more port density; four times the switching capacity, and 60 percent reduction of power consumption per switched Gb/s than the prior platform, according to Ciena. The upgrades include up to 15 terabits of capacity and are powered by Ciena's silicon chips, housed in the same footprint and provided via in-service upgrades to mitigate service disruption, the company said.
Ciena 5430 Packet-Optical Platform
Because the 5430 uses Ciena’s WaveLogic 3 Extreme chipset, it now reaches quadruple the prior model's 100G DWDM port density and provides additional modulation flexibility, the vendor said. Enterprises can individually program each port to operate in QPSK or 16QAM modulation, thereby maximizing capacity for reach on any card, according to Ciena.
The update introduces a new family of packet networking features that includes Metro-Ethernet-Forum (MEF) based services that deliver speedier turn-up and delivery, enhanced and consistent service delivery, and enable service providers to seamlessly evolve from circuit to packet, the vendor said. Using Ciena's OneConnect Intelligent Control plane, enterprises can tap the 5430's intelligent software to optimize operations, cut costs, accelerate service turn-up, and build a more dynamic network infrastructure, the company added.
Ciena, which declined to disclose pricing for the 5430, has more than 1,000 5430 nodes in the market, with more than 40 at global customers, said Masoud. There is no forklift upgrade required; rather, it's a "simple and in-service upgrade procedure" that uses the existing 5430 chassis, he said, and Ciena designed the 5430 to integrate with its converged packet optical solutions. Typically, IT and network planning teams that have to provide high-capacity networking between different sites, as well as research and engineering and government, are involved in acquiring the 5430, said Masoud.
"The web-scale effect is necessitating an infrastructure evolution; operators are pressured for capacity, agility, data efficiency and lower costs. It is critical that operators maximize ROI, ensure high reliability, and enable a path for future growth without the need of a major influx of Capex or disrupting the network for capacity expansion," he said.
One business already tapping the updated 5430: Korean telecommunications giant SK Telecom.
The company – which has more than 28 million mobile subscribers – today announced it is deploying the 5430 as part of its nationwide infrastructure upgrade.
"This deployment will ensure that SK Telecom is able to effectively and efficiently support next-generation mobile and business services, preparing the country for the high-bandwidth future and new innovations, such as software defined networking," said Choi, Seung-Won, senior vice president of Network Division, SK Telecom, in a statement.
