Calient & Cyan partner for CDC ROADM deployment

NESC will deploy the ROADMs in 14 nodes within its 915-mile network as part of a network expansion project funded via $43.5 million from the broadband stimulus program. The CDC ROADMs will feature CALIENT’s S320 3D MEMS photonic switch working with Cyan’s Z77 packet-optical transport platform, all under the control of Cyan 360 operational software. NESC will deploy additional Z77 platforms without the CDC features closer to the network edge, says Frank Wiener, Cyan’s vice president of marketing.

The network is designed for remote provisioning, reconfiguration, and troubleshooting, according to CALIENT’s Daniel Tardent, director of product marketing. For example, the photonic switches can be used to cut in OTDRs from the Network Operations Center. The goal, said Tardent, is to limit truck rolls to instances of equipment failure.

CALIENT introduced the S320 switch at OFC/NFOEC this past March . The switches can support 320x320 ports – and the CDC ROADM nodes likely will require most if not all of them. For example, the ring will support 40 wavelengths, which means 40 ports for eastbound and another 40 for westbound traffic. In addition, NESC plans to offer both 1-Gbps and 10-Gbps services, so nodes will need to be available to switch traffic through the appropriately configured transponders and muxponders. And that doesn’t include the ports necessary to accommodate traffic on the customer-facing portion of the node.

Tardent and Wiener said that they see additional opportunities for CDC ROADMs using their respective systems. However, they declined to discuss how they might address these opportunities, noting that the two companies haven’t announced any formal partnership.

Tardent says deployment of the CDC ROADMs has already begun. The goal of the open access network is to provide service providers with connectivity to more than 340,000 residents and hundreds of schools, colleges, clinics, hospitals, libraries, critical services government agencies, tribal governments, and telecommunications partners in northwest Minnesota.

“The Northeast Service Cooperative is a key regional resource for education, health care, information technology and economic development in Northeast Minnesota,” said Paul Brinkman, executive director of NESC and CEO of Minnesota Telecom, via a press announcement describing the deployment. “Our mission to bring much-needed high-speed data services to such a diverse, rural area has been a collaborative effort among our members and partners. The flexibility and scalability of the Cyan/CALIENT network solution uniquely solves the challenges of this project and we’re excited to be the first application to successfully deploy this architecture.”