New Broadcom components target higher-speed carrier Ethernet aggregation

Broadcom today announced two new component-level carrier Ethernet switches aimed at enabling carrier Ethernet equipment manufacturers to build products to support greater density and higher connection speeds in the aggregation network.

The products also enable service providers to take what Jim McKeon, product marketing director for Broadcom’s Network Switch Infrastructure & Networking Group, called a hybrid approach toward network architecture. The hybrid approach, said McKeon in an interview, gives network operators considerable flexibility in implementing either a connection-oriented transport approach based on PTN or a more data-oriented and dynamic approach based on IP-RAN.

Today most Ethernet aggregation networks operate at 1 Gb/s, said McKeon. But he said, “we’re seeing an evolution toward 10 G at the edge,” which in turn will drive 40 G and 100 G speeds in the network core.

Broadcom also is seeing demand for higher-density aggregation devices because service providers “often don’t have the luxury of building out new nodes,” McKeon said. In addition, he said, “the core is expensive”—and service providers increasingly are looking to make the best use of the core by feeding it with a smaller number of higher-speed interfaces, rather than a larger number of lower-speed interfaces.

Another important issue that is currently being debated by network operators is whether to use a traditional connection-oriented approach to transport based on PTN or a more data-oriented and dynamic approach based on IP-RAN, said McKeon.

In North America, McKeon sees a bias toward PTN because it is more similar to what they have been using. But in emerging markets such as China that do not have a large embedded network base, operators are more willing to try IP-RAN as a means of gaining network efficiencies, McKeon said.
Eventually, McKeon sees North American operators and operators in other developed markets taking greater interest in IP-RAN, however. “The same concept [that now applies in China] will play out in the rest of the world,” said McKeon. China’s situation, he said, “is not so unique except that they’re building out big networks so quickly.”

Broadcom’s new carrier Ethernet switches include the StrataXGS BCM56640 series for modular platforms and the StrataXGS BCM56540, which McKeon called a “fixed” version that has a higher level of integration between various switch functions.

Both products support a hybrid approach to network architecture that can support either PTN or IP-RAN, McKeon said.

PTN is more of a Layer 2 approach and IP-RAN is more of a Layer 3 approach—and traditionally Layer 2 and Layer 3 functions have required their own independent look-up memory, he explained. But he said Broadcom has collapsed lookup functionality into a common pool of memory that can be shared between Layer 2 and Layer 3. The upshot, he said, is that operators “can create profiles appropriate for a wide variety of networks.”

The new Broadcom aggregation switches are scheduled to be available in the first half of 2012.

McKeon said the company’s current component line sells to a wide range of equipment providers, including Cisco, Huawei and Juniper.