I haven't had the time to follow closely here Frank, so apologies if this is a dupe (2nd half of article that starts with CTC):
"Forks in the Optical Road"
americasnetwork.com
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Calling Marco Polo
Last quarter, SilkRoad Inc. (San Diego) introduced an alternative called SilkRoad Refractive Synchronization Communication (SRSC).
The company's moniker refers to the ancient eastern trade routes used by Marco Polo to transport silk and other items of wealth between Europe and the East.
SilkRoad's goal is to help carriers transport a wealth of information across their existing and planned optical networks. Unlike DWDM, SRSC uses a single wavelength to send up to 200 Gbps of information through a single fiber today. The system has the potential to reach speeds of 10 Tbps (terabits per second), which is the capacity of fiber itself, according to Bob Freeman, vice president of operations at SilkRoad.
SilkRoad's technology can simultaneously accommodate many different signals in one pipe, including OC-48, FM radio, Motion Picture Experts Group (MPEG 2), or digitally compressed signals.
"Using DWDM, if you want to use more than one OC-48 channel, you would have to get another wavelength for each channel," Freeman says. "SRSC uses a frequency tag, or clock, and we can clock as many of those signals up to the level of our detector. The biggest difference between DWDM and SRSC is that we only have one laser."
SilkRoad unveiled its product in late 1998 to business executives, analysts and the media. SilkRoad demonstrated SRSC's ability to deliver, through a single laser, 840 channels of satellite programming at 93 Gbps through a 100-km length of fiber.
But that feat may not be enough to woo carriers. "Right now, they say they can go up to 100 Gbps, but we are already transporting 240 Gbps in our network today," says a spokesman from Sprint (Kansas City, Mo.).
SRSC technology refines a laser's output to one narrow line-width. SilkRoad's patented external modulation process collects multiple channels before they are introduced on the modulator. The system stacks the channels in a four-dimensional optical space and transmits them across a single wavelength.
In addition, the SRSC can transmit its payload across any type of fiber, Freeman notes. Thus, there is no need to install high-performance fiber to accommodate higher speeds.
SilkRoad will introduce its initial system this quarter. It will provide carriers with the equivalent of 32 OC-48 channels, Freeman says. (Systems released later this year will provide more capacity, although Freeman declined to reveal additional information.)
Even though SRSC does not yet match current capacity and speeds of existing DWDM systems, SilkRoad claims its ability to allow carriers to transmit any type of signal nearly 200 miles without regeneration through a single laser could save oodles of money.
Yet analysts and carriers remain skeptical of the claims SilkRoad is making. Some say they've looked at the product and determined that it's "not ready for prime time." Others want to know more about company funding and investors.
"I'm quite impressed with what they are doing. It could make lot of difference in the availability of high-bandwidth communications over the next couple of years," says Hans von Braun, research director at Creative Strategies Inc. (San Jose, Calif.). "The only question that came to mind is their financing. They are privately held and have been close about the financing and funding they've received to date. A project like this is going to take a lot of money."
SilkRoad chief financial officer Douglas Buie notes that since the product's launch, the company has raised $13 million in two rounds of financing.
"We made it plain that the purpose of discussion during the launch was not financing," Buie says.
"There is a lot of skepticism," counters Ken Kelly, senior analyst for Dataquest (San Jose, Calif.). "This is so simple that carriers are saying, ‘Why hasn't one of the biggies done it?' Some claim they have it or are looking at it. I don't know why the biggies haven't done it. Why did two guys from out east invent the airplane rather than a big company?"
Freeman adds that the biggest drawback to using a single wavelength to transmit high-bandwidth signals at high speeds is "being the first to do it."
Carriers that have met with SilkRoad plan to take a closer look at the system, according to Kelly.
Although one might expect SilkRoad to market SRSC to the IXCs first, the system is a good fit for any type of carrier or enterprise, Freeman says. "We thought we'd be concentrating on the long haul, but we found out that the system scales all the way down to the short haul and enterprise markets. DWDM doesn't carry itself down to these other networks," he notes.
DWDM's momentum is the biggest obstacle for SilkRoad; another could be the high amount of security the system offers. The inability to access signals could cause the government to voice concerns about the technology, von Braun says.
"As long as they don't promote that, they'll be fine," he notes.
Friend or Foe?
Although much of the discussion surrounding SilkRoad's launch has focused on performance, SilkRoad's goal is not to pit its technology against DWDM.
"We aren't in there to fight where DWDM is going in," Freeman says. "The technology could be offered alongside DWDM. DWDM vendors could use this technology to expand their business. We are not interested in ruining DWDM."
SilkRoad executives prefer to partner with interested parties rather than license the technology. However, the company has not met with DWDM vendors, says Freeman.
"Right now, we are going to service providers and saying, ‘here is a technology that can make you more money and let you provide services you will never be able to provide using other technologies'," Freeman says.
At press time the company was hiring a sales force to spread that message and was seeking a third-party distribution channel. Both CTC and SilkRoad will need talented sales forces to get their feet in carriers' doors while they're still open to new optical networking pathways.
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