Optical Alternatives

As traffic continues to increase and carriers begin to offer faster mobile Internet access with 3G technologies, they’ll need to increase the capacity and reliability of their backhaul networks. Today, most carriers lease T1/E1 and T3/E3 copper lines to connect their wireless traffic to the PSTN. Carriers can gain cost efficiencies for their backhaul networks while they move to bandwidth-intensive 3G by using a fiber-optic network. They also gain faster time-to-market provisioning capabilities compared to the typical process for gaining added T1/E1 and T3/E3 lines.

Lucent is introducing its WaveStar Wireless Network Solution (visit #3432 or www.lucent.com). With optical systems from Bell Labs, carriers gain the tools to create and maintain their own high-capacity, fiber-optic networks to connect base stations and MSCs to long-distance networks.

The WaveStar Wireless Network Solution primarily uses SONET and synchronous digital hierarchy (SDH) transmission systems that operate at speeds ranging from 155Mb/s to 10Gb/s.

The systems are arranged in a ring architecture that aggregates base-station traffic in a region or a city. They then feed the traffic either directly to MSCs or to higher-capacity rings. MSCs can be interconnected through these higher-speed optical rings, which also can connect the switches to the PSTN or to a carrier’s own long-haul network. WaveStar inter-operates with wireless technology from all leading vendors.

“Operators can no longer rely on embedded backhaul facilities to carry the data-intensive traffic required for UMTS,” said Scott Erickson, Lucent Technologies vice president of mobility segment, in a reference to 3G services. “We’re offering them a flexible and cost-effective solution that takes advantages of both optical and broadband wireless technologies to maximize network uptime while cost-effectively managing capacity growth.”

Just weeks ago, Lucent signed its first contract worth approximately $20 million with Shanghai Telecom to provide its optical products.

Meanwhile, Nortel Networks (visit #2032 or www.nortel.com) has been selected by Cegetel to build its new UMTS 3G wireless infrastructure.

As part of the company’s strategy, Wings of Light unifies IP, optical and wireless capabilities, and converges multiprotocol wireless access/aggregation with IP core networking transported on self-healing, super-capacity optical rings. “Wings of Light” solutions enable new applications and devices to be implemented on 3G networks.