Sycamore Networks Ushers In the Era of ‘Just-In-Time' SONET Services
telecommagazine.com
April 1999
Optical networking is here. The emergence and initial success of startup Sycamore Networks has proven the business case for optimizing SONET infrastructure and its current bandwidth-utilization model. Fueled by hot new products that promise to redefine SONET architecture and the business savvy of its ex-Cascade Communications front office, Sycamore has already announced Williams as its first customer. It's a good bet that other carriers will follow suit, too, since the company's SN 6000 and SN 8000 product family executes a simple mission: enabling service providers to provision new private lines for ATM and IP trunk services at OC-48 speeds more cheaply and simply, with minimal space and power requirements, by deploying a few SN 6000 Intelligent Optical Transport node boxes at desired points on existing SONET rings. Adding an SN 6000 to a carrier's network means service can be provisioned “just in time,” without the delay and expense of specialized equipment inherent in traditional SONET buildouts.
The SN 6000 works in point-to-point applications, providing the same functionality in the optical domain as the usual multiple-SONET-box approach so carriers can provision, manage and fault-isolate their optical networks. In a typical configuration, the chassis takes in the user OC-48 signal and wavelength shifts the traffic onto unused optical spectrum on a carrier's existing OC-192 system. The new wavelengths run over the same OC-192 network, but do not have to add/drop at the same points: the wavelength can continue on to a further site. This approach also enables greater scalability: just add a wavelength in the optical domain.
“I think the great thing about the Sycamore solution is that it will help carriers, especially the bandwidth barons such as Qwest and Level 3, to deliver services, not just bandwidth, quickly,” said Deb Mielke, principal at Treillage Network Strategies. “The biggest problems that carriers have center around services and the time it takes to develop and deliver them. Sycamore's products should help in both areas and have the potential to explode carrier cost and delivery models for high-end networking services. The resulting cost and process improvements will enable carriers to offer high availability optical networking solutions quickly and cost effectively to the enterprise and other carriers.”
The SN 8000 family, unlike the SN 6000, is designed to stand alone. Providing an optical networking infrastructure for access, interoffice and regional networks for any topology (rings, linear and chains), the SN 8000, SN 8400 and SN 860 form a family of intelligent optical add/drop multiplexers that combine adaptation, switching and routing of wavelengths. Essentially, they support any-to-any lightpath connectivity over a distance of 500 km before regeneration is required. This means a user can come into the network at any point and leave the network at any other point without using SONET equipment to terminate the wavelength.
“Sycamore's SN 6000 and SN 8000 product family focuses on solving significant service provider problems: namely, reducing planning, provisioning and turn-up time; reducing power and space requirements; providing features that enhance service providers' ability to sell value-added services, not ‘pipes;' and obtaining tools so that their customers can manage their own services,” said Dana Cooperson, senior analyst in WDM and optical networking at RHK. “Sycamore's product strategy does not require service providers to blanket their networks with Sycamore boxes, or backhaul traffic, or radically alter their operations before they can benefit from improved asset utilization, quicker time to market and increased ability to offer services instead of just bandwidth.”
The SN 6000 is currently available and starts at $20,000 for a base system. The SN 8000 will be available in Q2 99, while the SN 8400 and SN 860 will ship the following quarter. For more information, visit the vendor's Web site at www.sycamorenet.com.
-----
Mohan, I think your right.
regards,
dkg |
