Today Corvis Corporation (Nasdaq: CORV) announced that Broadwing Inc. (NYSE: BRW), has successfully completed the first field trial of Corvis’s 10-Gbit/s DWDM (dense wavelength-division multiplexing) product over a 4,000-km stretch of Broadwing’s nationwide network without electrical regeneration.

Using Corvis’s OC192 product, Broadwing transmitted traffic at 10 Gbit/s on a section of its network that stretches from Phoenix to Fort Worth, Texas, and back, without having to regenerate the optical signal. This is the longest terrestrial transmission distance demonstrated in the field to date without any electrical regeneration. Eliminating expensive optical-to-electric-to-optical regeneration will allow Broadwing to increase the performance and reliability of its network, while reducing capital and operating costs, says the vendor.

Corvis announced its 10-Gbit/s over ultra-long distances some time ago. But in its previous field trial, only OC48 interfaces were tested, sparking rumors that its 10-gig developments were in trouble (see Corvis Completes First Field Trials).

Corvis may announce yet more impressive distances and speeds in the future as the company integrates technology it acquired from Algety Telecom SA (see Corvis Boosts IPO With Acquisition).

The completion of successful field trials helps validate its highly valued stock, which hit the roof when it first debuted on the Nasdaq a few weeks ago (see Avici and Corvis Make Stunning Debuts). And if industry gurus like Wu-Fu Chen, who see ultra-long-haul DWDM as one of the hottest tickets in optical networking, are right, Corvis stock may continue to shoot up as more customers announce completion of trials (see Wu-Fu Chen: In It for the Long Haul).

-- Marguerite Reardon, senior editor, Light Reading, http://www.lightreading.com