Ciena Corporation reportedly announced that it’s adding Carrier Ethernet service delivery switches to its Carrier Ethernet Service Delivery portfolio.

 

The additions enhance the ability to combine low-touch devices and intelligent software to simplify and scale Carrier Ethernet service delivery, by automating and accelerating service creation and activation in access and metro networks.

 

To meet the growing demands of the global Carrier Ethernet business services market and to enable metro transport services for mobile backhaul and wholesale applications, Ethernet services must overcome legacy business and transport services problems. They include the inability to scale bandwidth as customers’ needs change, the high cost-per-bit of traffic and the significant amount of time it takes between a customer placing an order and the service provider dealing with his or her service.

 

Ciena’s Carrier Ethernet Service Delivery Portfolio delivers a solution to capitalize on this market – a range of programmable, carrier-class devices that use a common service-aware operating system and unified Ethernet services management software. The resulting service-driven network can provide a diverse Carrier Ethernet service mix to multiple customers from a range of locations – indoor, outdoor, environmentally controlled or not – and reduce installation time by up to 75 percent through automated service creation, provisioning and activation.

 

“To continue growing their Ethernet services business, service providers need to expand the addressable market by taking the time, cost and complexity out of service delivery by turning it into an almost ‘plug and play’ experience,” said Stan Hubbard, a senior analyst at Heavy Reading. “Ciena’s Carrier Ethernet portfolio addresses this challenge throughout the full service lifecycle – intelligently automating service creation, activation, and management and upgrades to deliver Ethernet business and transport services at a lower cost per bit with low-touch operations and the flexibility to adapt to dynamic customer requirements in the future.”

 

Ciena’s Carrier Ethernet Service Delivery Portfolio combines low cost and high capacity of Ethernet with the reliability, management and service quality usually associated with SONET/SDH networks.

 

The latest version is upgraded with new Ethernet control and management plane protocols, Ethernet encapsulation techniques and Carrier Ethernet Operations, Administration and Maintenance mechanisms – all of which enhance its fault and performance management, virtual switching, SLA verification and quality of service capabilities.

 

“Our leadership in intelligent software and optical control plane technology has given us expertise in how to leverage network automation to take cost out of the network, improve reliability and accelerate service delivery – and we are bringing that same leadership to Ethernet business and transport services with our advanced Ethernet switching, control plane and management technology,” said Steve Alexander, chief technology officer at Ciena. “Our intelligent, software-driven automation minimizes the complexity and challenges of new Carrier Ethernet service delivery resulting in faster rollouts, fewer mistakes, and less service downtime, which lowers overall costs and empowers service providers to be truly agile in responding to customers’ initial and on-going service needs.”