2:00 PM -- Carrier Ethernet is a now a viable alternative for operators in access and cellular backhaul networks, according to RAD Data Communications Ltd. (See RAD Ready to Replace TDM/SDH.)

The vendor has piled several features onto its Internet access demarcation devices -- including timing-over-packet capabilities, hardware-based OAM (operations, administration, and maintenance), performance and traffic management, and support for G.8032 Ethernet ring protection.

All of that capability leads to RAD's claim that Carrier Ethernet is ready to replace TDM/SDH in access and cellular backhaul networks.

RAD says it's ready, but are operators? (See Carriers Go Slow on Packet Backhaul, StarHub Sets Packet Precedent, and Carriers Don't Trust Ethernet Backhaul?)

The first implementation of most of this feature set is with a "major carrier" in Europe in a cellular backhaul deployment, Yacov Cazes, director of Carrier Ethernet product management and business development at RAD, tells Unstrung.

— Michelle Donegan, European Editor, Unstrung