Opportunities and Strategies - 400G DWDM/OTN Networks

Driven by applications like the Internet of Things (IoT), video streaming, social media, cloud computing, and AI, digital traffic is skyrocketing. As a result, network operators and service providers find themselves struggling with the need to upgrade capacity while retaining the value of their existing infrastructure. Installing new fiber is time consuming and expensive. Adding new low-capacity and spectrally inefficient wavelengths over existing fiber is neither cost effective nor scalable enough to address the surge in bandwidth demand. The latest 400G technology provides the solution.

With the help of transponders, muxponders, and the optical transport network (OTN) protocol, carriers and network providers can improve fiber capacity for new 100/400Gb Ethernet services. These devices also enable them to aggregate a mix of legacy services and transmit them over 400G wavelengths. The approach boosts spectral efficiency and slashes the cost per transported bit. Perhaps just as important, 400G DWDM and OTN equipment puts the focus on interoperability, flexibility, scalability, and ease of integration.