The ON2020 panel session at OFC this year, titled “Industry Visions for a Converged Optical Networking Roadmap,” provided a fascinating insight into the challenges faced by a diverse set of network operators and highlighted some of the technologies that will be required in future optical networks. Some key themes were shared by the various operator […]
400G Achieves Significant Market Availability
400G is now supported on systems from many companies, providing an attractive alternative to using multiple 100G interfaces where higher throughput is required. 400G interfaces and optical modules have been challenging to develop, but these are rapidly becoming available from multiple suppliers. During 2018, companies will introduce second-generation 400G interfaces and optical modules, significantly increasing […]
ON2020 Shares Operator Visions for the Future of Optical Networking at OFC 2018
Operators are already looking at the optical networks required to deliver cloud and 5G services over the next five to ten years, and ON2020 provides a forum for the industry to share these visions and develop technology roadmaps and evolution scenarios to ensure the right solutions are available. At OFC, the ON2020 group, now officially launched as […]
Competition Heats Up for SDN/NFV Processing
The shift to application and network virtualization by operators and service providers requires a new generation of multicore processors that are being introduced by many vendors. Cloud services are being delivered from hyper-scale data centers and through edge networks where support for virtual applications and virtualized networks requires servers with multicore processors that have many […]
Why Gfast Is About to Come of Age
The latest Gfast chipsets, supporting Amendment 3 functionality, are offering a mature solution for gigabit broadband that is re-igniting the copper-versus-fiber debate. Since the first Gfast chipsets were introduced in 2014, vendors have worked with network operators and system developers to run trials and experiment with higher performance, longer reach and support for coax. The […]
Ubiquitous SDN Acceleration Is Coming
Smart network interface cards (NICs) with high-level programming are enabling the step up in application and virtualization performance that is needed to deliver on the promise of software-defined networking (SDN). By using smart NICs in every server, operators can ensure that network virtualization, load balancing and other low-level functions are offloaded from the server CPUs, […]
ON2020 Looks to the Future at ECOC
Following a successful workshop at OFC in March this year, ON2020 has spent the summer surveying the network needs and evolution strategies of leading network operators and is ready to share the results during a focused session at ECOC 2017 in Gothenburg, Sweden. This will be a unique opportunity to better understand the long-term requirements for optical networking beyond […]
100G Growth Fuels Race to 400G & Beyond
The widespread deployment of 100G connections in data centers and across networks is driving demand for 400G solutions and funding the development of 400G components. Those vendors that have successfully developed competitive 100G optical modules and components are simultaneously growing 100G volume, developing lower-cost 100G solutions and introducing 25G, 50G, 200G, 400G and 600G products. […]
ON2020: Driving Innovative Optical Network Solutions
As the optical networking community gathers at OFC’17 in Los Angeles, we are seeing an unprecedented number of new technologies and solutions being developed and there is a compelling need for companies to work together to ensure that the combination of these innovative optical network solutions meets network operator demands. Optical Network 2020 has recently […]
Switching Redefined for the Virtual Network
The shift to cloud services and virtual networks has made data center switches — and the switch devices used in them — key to delivering maximum network performance and service flexibility. Maximum network performance requires low latency switches with 25Gbit/s serial interfaces and 25GE and 100GE ports. Maximum service flexibility requires switches with support for […]