A 40G undersea deployment is good news for Ciena and a reminder that 100G needs some time in the oven

Craig Matsumoto, Editor-in-Chief, Light Reading

November 16, 2011

1 Min Read
Tata Stops Short of 100G Undersea

Tata Communications Ltd. announced Wednesday that it's installed coherent 40Gbit/s links on an undersea route between New York and London.

The buildout uses the Ciena Corp. (NYSE: CIEN) 6500 Packet-Optical Platform, which is 100Gbit/s capable -- but Tata chose to go with just 40Gbit/s for now.

Deploying 40Gbit/s gave Tata more capacity and a lower cost per gigabit-per-second, says Matthew Ma, Tata's vice president of transport network engineering.

Why this matters
There have been a couple of recent announcements about 100Gbit/s undersea trials, using Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. and Infinera Corp. (Nasdaq: INFN) gear, but Tata's deployment is a reminder that the technology is still new. Specifically, Tata decided no available 100Gbit/s technology is ready for 7,000-kilometer distances yet.

Coming elements such as soft-decision forward error correction (FEC) would help, Ma says.

Ma expects to start his serious 100Gbit/s shopping in about six months, when more equipment is available. He admits Ciena, while not a shoo-in, has an obvious advantage. "The common equipment is deployed. It would make the 100Gbit/s deployment relatively easy, almost -- not quite, but almost -- plug-and-play."

For more
News on 100Gbit/s projects that are underwater in a good way.

  • Huawei, Hibernia Atlantic Test Transatlantic 100-Gig

  • NTT Sets 100G Undersea Plan

  • Infinera Crosses the Pacific

  • Infinera's 100G Goes Undersea

  • Gulf Subsea Network Boasts 100G



— Craig Matsumoto, West Coast Editor, Light Reading

About the Author(s)

Craig Matsumoto

Editor-in-Chief, Light Reading

Yes, THAT Craig Matsumoto – who used to be at Light Reading from 2002 until 2013 and then went away and did other stuff and now HE'S BACK! As Editor-in-Chief. Go Craig!!

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