LITTLE ROCK, Ark. – Windstream Wholesale, an optical technology leader of fast and flexible advanced solutions, today announced the completion of a live network trial that successfully deployed a 1 Terabit wave over 541 kilometers across Windstream's Intelligent Converged Optical Network (ICON) network between Dallas and Tulsa. The trial set an industry-leading real-world benchmark using digital coherent optics technology by Acacia, now part of Cisco.

The team also looped the circuit to establish an 800 Gigabit link over a live network measuring 1,082 kilometers. As part of its core strategic pillars, Windstream Wholesale continues to push the industry forward with technologies that will help keep pace with customer bandwidth demands and lowering the cost per bit.

The trial employed Acacia's Coherent Interconnect Module 8 (CIM 8) module, which is powered by the Jannu DSP and is the industry's first pluggable module in the "high-performance" category that represents the next evolution in driving high-capacity optical connections to expand the network.

The 1TB trial marked the first use of pluggable modules in the high-performance category. Acacia's modules reduced power consumption by more than 65% while being more than 70% smaller than traditional network gear. In addition, the performance gains allow for a significant jump in route coverage of high line rates such as 800G and above.

Windstream previously set a 400 ZR+ record using Acacia pluggables. The company is continuing to expand the reach and capacity of its current 400G coast-to-coast wave service and more will be announced in the coming months.

Windstream's ICON provides open and disaggregated networking infrastructure, enabling wholesale and enterprise technology customers to select unique custom routes, maintain operational insights with Windstream's Network Intelligence functions, and place their networks closer to the edge to better serve end-users.

Read the full press release here.

Windstream