Ottawa-based startup Ceyba is taking the wraps off an approach to optical core networking which it believes will make a persuasive cost-benefit case to carriers who have so far registered lukewarm response to next-generation technology at a time of over capacity and capital retrenchment.
While market conditions are far worse than imagined when Ceyba (www.ceyba.com), under the name Solinet Systems, began developing the new product nearly two years ago, the company believes there is market demand for this core system. The company says it will offer significant savings now and over the lifetime of the network, no matter what ongoing market demand requires in terms of capacity allocations and design modifications. “It’s true the capital spending is lower than we anticipated, but we believe a major reason carriers have not embraced all-optical networking technology has a lot to do with the inflexibility of the choices they’ve had up to now,” says Benoit Fleury, vice president of marketing at Ceyba. Fleury adds that the company changed its name because people were erroneously assuming its former name implied it was using soliton technology in its products.
Ceyba’s new system, slated for general availability starting in June, would overcome carrier reluctance by allowing them to move OEO (optoelectronic) conversion points out of the core while affording them the ability to implement long- or ultra long-haul options in either 10gbps or 40gbps mode without having to reconfigure core elements, Fleury says. “Despite the over capacity that exists in many places, there are major routes where carriers want to add capacity, and we’re in discussions with many of these potential customers,” he adds.
Fleury’s point is seconded by David Krozier, senior analyst with RHK. “Carriers are evaluating the next generation of core optical equipment, and they’re going to look closely at solutions like [Ceyba’s], which addresses transport constraints that have kept first-generation optically transparent systems from widespread deployment,” Krozier says. Such solutions must save carriers money now, as fiber exhaust develops along high-density routes, while affording them more flexible means to expand in the future, he adds.
DWDM systems typically have been designed to implement 40gbps wavelengths in bands separate from 10gbps wavelengths. The new Ceyba system, however, allows network operators to implement the two speeds within the same band using transponder cards that communicate with all the amplifiers and other system components to make adjustments in equalization as different wavelengths become operational, Fleury notes. The same dynamic transmission control capabilities apply to implementation of ultra long haul, where systems optimized for long haul can be adjusted automatically to operate optically over distances of up to 4,000 km. with insertion of transponder cards equipped with advanced forward error correction. The only manual intervention required to accommodate the ultra long-haul wavelengths is the insertion of Raman amplifier cards at certain amplification points along the routes, Fleury says.
A key feature of the first release of the Ceyba Agile Networking Solution involves network-wide implementation of provisioning and performance management techniques in the optical domain which, heretofore, have been applied manually by technicians at network interface points, Fleury says. These include the tasks performed by optical time domain reflectometers, which keep tabs on performance of every receiver in the system; optical spectrum analyzers, which monitor signal power at each wavelength; and bit error testing, and Q measurements, which report on the optical margins in the system.
The first product release will offer only 10gbps transponder cards. The company has not disclosed the rollout schedule for the 40gbps option.
This first release provides for optical wavelength add/drop at “flexible wave hubs” and sub-wavelength demultiplexing through splitting of the channel into two paths, one on the node bypass link that avoids electrical regeneration of the wavelength and the other into an OEO demultiplexer that extracts the 2.5gbps signal from the 10gbps wavelength. The hubs also allow for flexibility in path directions, moving beyond the typical two-path option of, say, north and south, to accommodate distribution to other points on the compass.
Because the entire Ceyba system is centrally managed from the network operation center in the optical domain at the core and in the optical and electronic domains at the edges, it is ready to accommodate implementation of photonic switching as the company brings that capability to market in the future, Fleury notes. “We’ve designed the system so that you can enhance it with photonic switching without taking the network out of service,” he says. “Photonic switching has been very difficult to prove in from a cost standpoint because the tunable translators, filters and other components are very expensive,” he adds. “So you need to be able to provision connections quickly for switching while recognizing the majority will be static and don’t need to incur the costs of those components.”
Photonic switching techniques are maturing, with technology about to enter the market that will significantly lower costs, Fleury says. Ceyba intends to have such capabilities on the market sometime next year.
