CORV from Tom Hua's thread:
To:Tom Hua who wrote (8587)
From: Zeddie88 Tuesday, Apr 24, 2001 1:45 PM
Respond to of 8590
Hi Tom,
Here's something that I got via email from LightReading about CORV:
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Today's focus: Corvis grooms the metro
By Marguerite Reardon
Corvis has let slip some details of its next big development in
optical networking - a grooming switch that will compete head to head
with the CoreDirector from its archrival, Ciena.
The new switch has been under development since last summer when
Corvis acquired Baylight Networks, a small start-up designing optical
network access systems and subsystems, says David Smith, vice
president of hardware engineering.
The product, which is expected to go into alpha testing by year-end,
is far enough along that Corvis has now leased an 88,000 square foot
research and development space for it in Columbia, Md.
"The engineers have been sharing space for a long time," Smith said.
"And they've been busting for their own space. Now that they're
getting closer to having something, they can't continue to share a
lab anymore."
Corvis's new switch extends the company's existing product range,
which furnishes all-optical long-haul backbones. "We're well aware
that you can't just stop at the core," Smith says. The new switch
will have an electrical rather than an optical core and will give
service providers a way of feeding traffic on and off their optical
backbones at the sort of bandwidths they want - multiples of STS1
(51.8M bit/sec) channels.
Ciena was first to market with a switch capable of grooming STS1s in
this way. It's already shipping a version of its CoreDirector with
256 x 256 ports, each operating at OC-48 (2.5G bit/sec). And it's
announced a 64 x 64 switch operating at OC-192 (10G bit/sec).
Corvis has made no secret of its intention to develop a similar sort
of switch but hasn't divulged details until now. Last week, however,
Smith let slip some of the product specs. "Our switch is going to
[be] big," he said. "I can't tell you specifics, but let's just say
big. "
He claims that the new switch will be able to scale to 512 x 512
ports. But he cautions that higher port counts may not be what
customers need.
"I'm not sure that 512 ports running at OC-192 are really necessary,"
he said. "Our switch will be able to do that, absolutely. But no one
is suggesting today that one feeder point could generate enough
traffic to need that kind of capacity. I'm sure it could happen
eventually, but things could be very different then."
Corvis also plans to match CoreDirector on granularity. Like
CoreDirector, the new Corvis switch will handle STS1 channels, Smith
says. Other vendors, such as Sycamore Networks and Tellium, have
started off with switches handling much fatter OC-48 connections, and
are now playing catch up with Ciena.
Smith agrees that granularity is an important aspect of any edge
switch. "It's really essential for any edge switch these days," he
said. He also says that Corvis's version will be able to concatenate
STS1s so that a bunch of them can operate as one big pipe.
Of course, it's one thing to talk about upstaging Ciena's
CoreDirector and it's another thing to actually do it. Developing
ASICs for such big grooming switches is said to push the limits on
semiconductor technology. Right now, Corvis has got its ASICs back
from the foundry but has yet to complete tests to make sure they work
as planned.
By the time Corvis ships its switch, the market also could be quite
crowded. Semiconductor vendors are developing off-the-shelf ASICs for
STS1 grooming switches - and when these arrive, other system vendors
are likely to jump on the bandwagon. The first among them could be
Sycamore, which is already talking about a 512 x 512 switch capable
of STS1 grooming. Start-up BrightLink Networks has plans for an even
bigger grooming switch based on a novel distributed architecture.
Financial analysts question whether Corvis has got deep enough
pockets to see all of its product plans through to fruition. With
over 1,400 employees, five facilities, and 2 year's worth of
inventory the company may have a tough time keeping up if the current
market conditions continue, they say.
In the quarter ending in September 2000 Corvis raised $1.1 billion in
financing, but burned about $185 million. Figures aren't yet
available for the following quarter.
"Two hundred million is clearly a lot of money," said Max Schuetz, an
analyst with Thomas Weisel Partners. "You look around and everyone
else is laying people off, and Corvis hasn't made a big effort to cut
costs. Either they have some big contracts that are imminent, or they
are a bit more optimistic than we are about the length of this
downturn." |
