Verizon trials 100G in routed configuration

Verizon moved a step closer to deploying 100 Gb/s backbone networks today with the announcement that it had successfully tested an end-to-end 100 Gb/s connection between two native router interfaces. The company already has deployed at least one 100 Gb/s point-to-point connection in its backbone network in Europe.

The new field trial--which used equipment from Juniper Networks, NEC Corporation of America and Finisair Corp.—successfully demonstrated the ability to route traffic at 100 Gb/s.

Although not all of the equipment required to support routed 100 Gb/s connectivity is on the market today, Verizon is hopeful that will change later this year and that the company will be able to begin deploying routed 100 Gb/s connectivity. “This calendar year our plans are to introduce more 100G in the U.S.,” Verizon Director of Optical Transport Network Architecture and Design Glenn Wellbrock told Connected Planet. “We’re trying to include the router in the U.S. deployment.”

The field trial announced today, which was completed on Feb. 25, used a Juniper T1600 Core Router interface and the NEC SpectraWave DWDM system, which was equipped with 100G real-time coherent transponders. Those transponders help enable higher per-channel data rates by maintaining a fixed relationship between frequency and phases of input and output signals.

Previously, Wellbrock explained, “WDM kept adding channels as opposed to increasing data rates, but now that we have used up all the tricks, we have started using coherent receivers.”

The field trial used two different ports on a single router with a 1520-kilometer section of fiber between them but as Wellbrock explained, the two router ports could have been several states away from one another and achieved the same result. The fiber used was “no different from other fiber in the network,” Wellbrock said, and no modifications to that fiber were required to support 100G transmission.

Verizon expects to have multiple suppliers for various elements of its 100G network. “We expect all of Tier 1 suppliers to support 100G,” Wellbrock said. “Not everyone will be ready this year but they all have embedded programs and are working toward 100G.”

As of now Verizon’s plans call for 100G connectivity only in the network core—although Wellbrock said that if a few customers wanted their own 100G connection, the network could be configured to accommodate them.