Network Infrastructure for Next Gen Central Offices (NGCO)

The Next Gen Cental Office (NGCO) is an amazing opportunity and a confluence of vision and product development, says Rochan Sankar, Senior Director, Switch Products, Broadcom.

NGCO requires virtualization and cloudification of the underlying network. The Ethernet-based interconnects for this infrastructure presents many opportunities for innovation.

A "2019 Next-Generation Central Office  Report" from AvidThink is available for download. It covers the evolution in NGCO, recent trends, and key projects like CORD and VCO, as well as the role of the NGCO in new applications in edge computing and SD-WAN/vCPE.

https://nginfrastructure.com/

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Arrcus scales out with Broadcom's Jericho2, raises $30m in Series B

Arrcus, a start-up that offers a hardware-agnostic network operating system for white boxes switches, announced multiple high-density 100GbE and 400GbE routing solutions for hyperscale cloud, edge, and 5G networks.

The company says its ArcOS software architecture has the foundational attributes to scale-out to an open aggregated routing solution, enabling operators to design, deploy, operationalize, and manage their infrastructure across multiple domains in the network.

"Our mission is to democratize the networking industry by providing best-in-class software, the most flexible consumption model, and the lowest total cost of ownership for our customers; we are now extending this by providing leading-edge open integration solutions for routing. ArcOS is the essential link to fully realize the unparalleled advancements in the 10Tbps Jericho2 SoC family and the resulting systems," Devesh Garg, co-founder and CEO of Arrcus.

The new ArcOS-based platforms, based on Broadcom’s 10Tbps, highly-flexible and programmable StrataDNX Jericho2 switch-router system-on-a-chip (SoC), include:

• 24 ports of 100G + 6 ports of 400G
• 40 ports of 100G
• 80 ports of 100G
• 96 ports of 100G

Key features enabled on these Jericho2-based platforms include:

• Faster network speeds – up to 10 Tbps switching capacity, which delivers 5X the performance compared to previous generation of Jericho+
• 4X increase in port density per chip compared to previous generation of Jericho+
• Higher route table scale – up to 2.6M IPv4 routes (1.3M IPv6) on chip
• Higher ACL scale of 96K with full IPv6 egress ACL support
• Line-rate flow monitoring with sFlow® that enables real-time flow visibility at scale
• Support for IPv4/IPv6/MPLS/Segment Routing forwarding
• Open standards-based BGP Flowspec
• Efficient, carrier-grade traffic management with scalable packet buffer memory
• Visibility into HW resource utilization (ACLs, routes, etc.) to assist with traffic distribution
• Selectable scale profiles with an ability to switch between profiles without a full system reboot
• Arrcus is also announcing the availability of ArcIQTM, an AI-driven analytics platform for delivering real-time, transformational insights and telemetry at scale for a modern network operations center (NOC) solution.

In addition, Arrcus announced $30 million in Series B funding, bringing its total capital raised to date to $49 million.

The new funding was led by Lightspeed Venture Partners and included full participation from existing investors General Catalyst and Clear Ventures.

Arrcus, which is based in San Jose, California, was founded in 2016 by Broadcom and Cisco veterans, Devesh Garg, Keyur Patel, and Derek Yeung. Company advisors include:

• Pankaj Patel, former EVP and CDO, Cisco
• Amarjit Gill, serial entrepreneur who founded and sold companies to Apple, Broadcom, Cisco, EMC, Facebook, Google, and Intel
• Kelly Ahuja, former SVP/GM, Service Provider Business, Cisco & presently CEO, Versa
• Fred Baker, former Cisco Fellow, IETF Chair & Co-Chair, IPv6 Working Group
• Farzad Nazem, former CTO, Yahoo
• Rajiv Patel, ex-VP of Engineering, Juniper
• Shawn Zandi, Director of Network Engineering, LinkedIn
• Nancy Lee, CHRO of Lime, ex-VP of People, Google

http://www.arrcus.com

Broadcom's Jericho2 switch-routing chip boasts 10 Tbps capacity

Wednesday, March 07, 2018  Broadcom, Ethernet, Silicon, Switching  

Broadcom announced commercial availability of its Jericho2 and FE9600 chips, the next generation of its StrataDNX family of system-on-chip (SoC) Switch-Routers.

The Jericho2 silicon boasts 10 Terabits per second of Switch-Router performance and is designed for high-density, industry standard 400GbE, 200GbE, and 100GbE interfaces. Key features include the company's "Elastic Pipe" packet processing, along with large-scale buffering with integrated High Bandwidth Memory (HBM).

The new device is shipping within 24 months from its predecessor Jericho+., Jericho2 delivers 5X higher bandwidth at 70% lower power per gigabit.

In addition to Jericho2, Broadcom is shipping FE9600, the new fabric switch device with 192 links of the industry's best performing and longest-reach 50G PAM-4 SerDes. This device offers 9.6 Terabits per second fabric capacity, a delivers 50% reduction in power per gigabit compared to its predecessor FE3600.

“The Jericho franchise is the industry’s most innovative and scalable silicon used today in various Switch-Routers by leading carriers,” said Ram Velaga, Broadcom senior vice president and general manager, Switch Products. “I am thrilled with the 5X increase in performance Jericho2 was able to achieve over a single generation. Jericho2 will accelerate the transition of carrier-grade networks to merchant silicon-based systems with best-in-class cost/performance.”

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Crehan: Top 3 clouds account for majority of whitebox Ethernet switch deployments

Three of the largest hyperscale cloud service providers account for most of the whitebox-class data center Ethernet switch shipments, according to recent reports from Crehan Research Inc.

Amazon, Google and Facebook combined to exceed two-thirds of total 2018 annual volumes.

Whitebox-class data center Ethernet switch shipments as a whole had a robust annual increase, to exceed 20% of the total annual volumes; but without Amazon, Google and Facebook, whitebox-class switching accounted for 7%.

“Although there seems to be a fair amount of tire-kicking, pilot projects and evaluations of whitebox-class data center switching, its overall adoption outside of three of the largest hyperscale cloud service providers has, so far, remained a relatively modest portion of overall data center switching,” said Seamus Crehan, president of Crehan Research. “Furthermore, the branded Ethernet switch vendors now offer customers what once was generally attainable only from whitebox switch deployments, including disaggregated open networking, programmability and significant price reductions.”

The boundary between branded and whitebox-class data center switching continues to blur, as evidenced by the following examples:

• The hyperscale internet service provider Tencent is deploying Cisco’s merchant silicon-based Nexus 34180YC Ethernet switch with the SONiC operating system in its data centers.
• Arista has jointly developed its most recent data center switch (the 7368X4) with Facebook which had historically worked with whitebox-class vendors such as Accton/Edgecore and Celestica, where the data center switch design was solely by Facebook.
• Branded Ethernet switch vendors such as Dell EMC, Juniper and Mellanox offer disaggregated hardware/software solutions to deliver more flexibility and openness to data center networking customers.

Crehan’s reports further indicate that, while the overall market adoption of whitebox-class data center switching is in the twenty percent range it is higher than this for the newer and faster networking speeds. This is largely because Amazon, Google and Facebook tend to be earlier adopters of these newer and faster speeds. For example, almost all of the early volume in 400GbE data center switching is driven by whitebox-class switches, due to Google’s dominance of these early deployments. “We expect that, similar to other Ethernet speeds, the portion of whitebox-class data center switch volumes will decline as a broader customer base starts to deploy 400GbE switches,” Crehan said.

http://www.crehanresearch.com

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CenturyLink expands its intercity network with Corning's SMF-28 fiber

CenturyLink announced a significant expansion of its inter-city multi-conduit infrastructure with plans to add 4.7 million miles of fiber in North America and parts of Europe.

The first phase of this overbuild fiber network, completed in June, connects more than 50 major cities throughout the U.S. The expansion leveraged the multi-conduit infrastructure all ready in place. The second phase of this expansion will include areas in Europe and will be completed by early 2021.








The project uses Corning's SMF-28 ULL fiber and SMF-28 Ultra fiber in a hybrid Corning SST-UltraRibbon cable. With a silica core design, SMF-28 ULL fiber offers the lowest loss of any terrestrial-grade optical fiber and will provide the CenturyLink network with a boost in optical signal-to-noise ratio (OSNR) which can extend optical reach at very high data rates.

CenturyLink said the added capacity will further improve the scalability of the network to meet the high bandwidth demands of emerging technologies and applications such as 5G, augmented reality, high-definition video streaming and the Internet of Things.

"Our newly built intercity fiber network, created with the latest optical technology, is another example of how our diverse fiber assets differentiate us from other network providers," said Andrew Dugan, CenturyLink chief technology officer. "Our multi-conduit infrastructure has a significant amount of capacity for supporting the growing demand for fiber and will allow us to quickly and cost effectively deploy new fiber technology now and in the future. This uniquely positions CenturyLink to meet the needs of companies seeking highly reliable, low-latency network infrastructure designed to move massive amounts of data."

"A next-generation network requires next-generation optical infrastructure, and we believe Corning's fiber and cable innovations will enable CenturyLink and its customers to unlock the opportunities presented by the Internet of Things and other transformative technologies," said Dr. Bernhard Deutsch, vice president and general manager, Corning Optical Fiber and Cable. "With the expanded optical reach and capacity provided by our ultra-low-loss fiber, CenturyLink will magnify the capabilities of their expansive, scalable fiber network."

https://ir.centurylink.com/news/news-details/2019/CenturyLink-Expands-Fiber-Network-Across-US-and-Europe/default.aspx

MEF18: CenturyLink's Andrew Dugan on Network Transformation

Thursday, November 01, 2018  CenturyLink, MEF18  

 What does network transformation mean to CenturyLink?

Andrew Dugan, SVP Technology Planning & Network Architecture, CenturyLink says it is vital to understand that customers are undergoing transformations of their own. Enterprise applications are getting distributed into multiple clouds. Some workloads stay in private data centers and others are moved into hybrid or public clouds. Carriers, like CenturyLink, must provide networking services that are equally as dynamic as the service offered by cloud providers.

CenturyLink is developing products that allow for dynamic service creation. This allows for new connections to be set-up, capacity to be scaled, and VLANs to be controlled.

Another area of interest is MEF's LSO (lifecycle service orchestration) APIs for enabling dynamic services across carriers to public clouds. CenturyLink is heavily supporting MEF's efforts in this area.

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Telstra completes 5G end-to-end standalone call with Ericsson

Telstra completed Australia’s first end-to-end 5G SA (stand-alone) call over 3.6GHz spectrum using Ericsson’s Baseband 6630, Radio AIR6488 and a 5G SA device based on a MediaTek chipset.

5G Standalone will be the eventual architecture of 5G radio networks/

Emilio Romeo, Head of Ericsson Australia and New Zealand, says: “Successfully completing Australia’s and the southern hemisphere’s first 5G standalone call is a vital step in driving industrial productivity and bringing Industry 4.0 to life. 5G is not just another incremental upgrade, but a platform for innovation marking a new era of intelligent connectivity.  Together with Telstra – one of the world’s first operators to launch 5G commercially on 5G non-standalone (NSA) – we continue to lead and drive innovation to ensure Australia remains at the forefront of telecommunications technology.”

Channa Seneviratne, Network and Infrastructure Engineering Executive, Telstra says: “Telstra has achieved a number of world and Australian milestones on our 5G journey and the successful completion of Australia’s first 5G end-to-end standalone call on Telstra’s network is the latest entry. This continues Telstra’s ongoing participation in global 5G leadership whilst simultaneously driving the deployment of 5G in Australia. To date we’ve already launched 5G in 10 cities, and this will increase to at least 35 cities over the next 12 months. Making this stand-alone 5G call at our 5G Innovation Centre contributes to our ongoing end-to-end 5G ecosystem learnings. This is another example of the ongoing industry collaboration working within the 5G eco-system and technology partners like Ericsson to pave the way for 5G advancements, and the benefits it will bring all Australians.”

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Australia's NBN Co now passes 10 million homes/businesses

Australia's NBN Co reached a major milestone: more than 10 million homes and businesses are now able to connect to the nbn access network. Less than twelve months of the build are remaining. nbn provides wholesale services to phone and internet providers.

Some additional notes:

• As at May 2019 62 percent of homes and businesses were on a 50Mbps wholesale speed plan or higher – compared with 44 percent in May 2018.
• There are currently more than 160 million connected devices in Australian households and almost 400 million expected by 2023, according to Telsyte’s Australian IoT@Home Market Study 2019. 25% of people say they are interested in making their homes ‘smarter’ but 35% indicate they would like help to set-up their connected services.

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Yahoo Finance Interview with Huawei's CEO Ren Zhengfei

Yahoo Finance conducted by Akiko Fujita on 19-July-2019 in Shenzhen.

Topics covered:

1:09 - Impact of being added to the U.S. entity list "We found we are fully capable of shaking off our reliance on the U.S. for our core products, and, depending on ourselves to survive. But we also have many other non-core products that we cannot do without U.S. components...."

2:05 - On U.S. national security concerns "There is not one individual component that can threaten the national security of the U.S. 5G is just a tool that helps networks operate faster. It is good for the world..."

2:34 - On the future of partnerships with U.S. suppliers: "If the U.S. government allows U.S. companies to continue to supply us, we will continue to buy from them, even in areas that we have developed our own alternative. We adopted this approach in the past...This year we could probably make about 270 million phones, and we have authorized the Consumer Business Department to buy 100 million chipsets from Qualcomm. We can live without Qualcomm but we are still committed to work with them. "

3:30 - On how long Huawei can last without supplies from the U.S.  "If U.S. companies were to stop supplying altogether, our production would not stop for a single day."



https://finance.yahoo.com/video/exclusive-huawei-ceo-says-company-142617289.html

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VeEX intros 400GE QSFP-DD PAM4 test module

VeEX introduced a dual-port 400GE QSFP-DD PAM4 test module for the MPA® Multi-Protocol Analyzer Series platform.

The new MPM-400AR module provides up to 800G of throughput to address the high capacity testing demands of the PAM4 Ethernet/transport market. The unit supports dual simultaneous and independent 400G QSFP-DD ports along with dual QSFP56 and SFP56 ports, enabling flexible testing capabilities for a wide range of optical transceivers, port and data rates all in the same module.

“At VeEX we strive to provide innovative test solutions and technology support to facilitate the industry’s demanding testing challenges of delivering next-generation products and services. The new MPM-400AR is the result of such commitment,” said Keith Cole, Vice President of Product Marketing, NEMs for VeEX. “Building upon our existing CFP8 test module (MPM-400G) and the first and only 400G handheld test set in the market (RXT-6400), the MPM-400AR raises the bar for native 400G PAM4 testing, in a compact, scalable, yet powerful rack-mount form factor.”

Used in the modular MPA platform with existing 10/100G application modules, the MPM-400AR provides simultaneous, independent, multi-port test capabilities, supporting all common and emerging transceiver form factors, from 400 Gbps to 10 Mbps. Test automation is key for high volume applications and multiple APIs are supported, including native Python, providing NEMs R&D/SVT labs, manufacturing, and service providers with a comprehensive all-in-one toolset for verification of PAM4 Ethernet/transport technologies.

https://www.veexinc.com/en-us/NewsAndEvents/PR-VeEX-Introduces-400GE-QSFP-DD-PAM4-Test-Module-for-the-MPA-Series-Platform

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