Turin Networks has built a PDH-based Ethernet over Copper card for its Traverse Multiservice Transport Switch to help more easily scale Carrier Ethernet networks.
Last year at this time, Turin announced its entry into the Ethernet over Copper space with the introduction of the Traverse PacketEdge1200 service edge aggregation platform, a stand-alone solution.
The new product being unveiled today, however, is a card for the company’s flagship Traverse chassis, and is highly scalable, noted Ralph Santitoro, director of Carrier Ethernet solutions at Turin.
“It’s the highest density in the industry, and you can put this into a CO so your cost of ownership is much lower,” said Santitoro of Turin, whose new solution in addition to aggregation does full Ethernet switching so can support all services defined by the Metro Ethernet Forum (MEF).
Ethernet Over Copper
Up to 336 DS1s can be aggregated per card, and 168 customer locations can be terminated by a single card, he said. Given there are 18 slots in each Traverse chassis, more than 3,000 locations can be terminated per chassis, Santitoro said. Ethernet solutions from the CPE-focused vendors can only terminate a very small number of T1s by comparison, he continued.
Because the Turin solution is based on the GFP-based approach (known as G.8040) Ethernet over Plesiochronous Digital Hierarchy (PDH refers to DS1/DS3 and E1/E3 circuits), as opposed to standard EoPDH or Ethernet over dry copper, Santitoro added that it is standards-based and more scalable due to bonding of multiple T1s. Santitoro added that several vendors have embraced the GFP-based EoPDH technology, but the others are CPE-focused rather than aggregation focused, as is Turin, so don’t have as scalable solutions.
According to Turin, the two main applications for its new solution are enterprise business services such as Layer 2 VPNs, point-to-point Ethernet (known as E-Line in MEF parlance), point-to-multipoint Ethernet (E-LAN), Ethernet access to IP services and VoIP; and wireless backhaul.
For wireless backhaul, this solution offers two key benefits, he said. One is allowing service providers to migrate their base stations to Ethernet for the long term. The other is enabling cellcos more efficiently fill the T1s they use for backhaul today (and may be locked into contracts for well into the future) by employing Ethernet muxing.
Santitoro said containing operational expenditures has become a key focus for wireless network operators such as Sprint and Verizon Wireless given they are shifting to flat-rate packages, so need to contain opex to maintain their margins. And, he added, better utilizing existing T1s can mean significant savings for a cellco. For example, Santitoro offered, a mid-sized mobile operator with 10,000 cell towers who pays $500 per month for a T1 per base station for backhaul can save $60 million if it defers investment in an additional T1 investment for each cell tower for just one year.
Turin would not disclose pricing for the new cards. First customer shipments of the new cards take place this month, with general availability expected in July.
