Here are a few notable accomplishments from the past year.

The Rise of 400G Pluggables
Bandwidth demands have continued to grow, putting pressure on cloud providers to increase the data center interconnects (DCI) that link their facilities around the globe. This has helped to drive the emergence of new architectures that could support coherent transport in the same form factors as client optics, to satisfy those demands in a cost-effective and operationally efficient way. 400G pluggables were designed to be plugged directly into switches and routers, offering the same density for both coherent DWDM and client optics in the same chassis.

Utilizing our 3D siliconization technology, Acacia introduced a family of 400G pluggable solutions featuring an expansive list of interoperability modes (400ZR, OpenZR+, Open ROADM MSA and CableLabs Coherent Optics Physical Layer Specification). These solutions were designed to enable DCI and service provider network operators to address increasing bandwidth demand through a simplified network architecture, helping to reduce both capital and operational expenditures.

Modules based on multi-sourced 400ZR DSPs are now being validated for readiness in DCI applications and network operators are evaluating OpenZR+ solutions with enhanced functionality.  For example, Acacia and Inphi recently demonstrated interoperability of 400ZR over 120km. In addition, Acacia and NTT Electronics announced successful interoperability testing of 400ZR and OpenZR+. At Acacia, we believe we will see system vendors and network operators announcing trials in the near future.

Coherent Moves to Edge and Access
The benefits of coherent have already been demonstrated in the metro, long-haul and submarine markets, and with the coming of 5G and edge computing, the time is right for coherent optics to take the next step and migrate to edge and access networks. We believe this market can benefit from the scalability, operational simplicity and improved total cost of ownership that coherent has to offer.

To address the wide variety of requirements in the edge and access market, Acacia recently announced a portfolio of products, including a coherent bi-directional pluggable optical module for cable and 5G wireless X-haul applications, a 100G coherent point-to-point edge and access solution for 5G Wireless X-haul and Enterprise Services, and a 100G coherent DWDM module for cable/fiber deep and 5G wireless X-haul applications.

Multi-Haul Coherent Solutions Take Off
With bandwidth demands continuing to rise, network operators have been looking for solutions that improve efficiency and maximize capacity utilizing while reducing network cost.  Multi-haul solutions have emerged to meet the needs of many markets including cloud, metro, long-haul and submarine network applications by providing the high performance and flexibility features required to address meet these demanding applications.

Acacia’s AC1200 product family offers customers a multi-haul solution designed to cost-effectively improve network utilization in a wide range of network architectures. Supporting transmission speeds of up to 1.2 Tbps, the AC1200 utilizes Acacia’s 3D shaping technology designed to optimize fiber capacity and reach by filling gaps in margin and spectrum. In addition to its higher capacity and density, Acacia’s AC1200 product family, when embedded inside a number of our network equipment manufacturer partners’ products, provides features designed to enable network operators to improve efficiency while reducing network costs.

Here are a few examples.

Long-haul Terrestrial Applications
ADVA announced that the FSP3000 TeraFlex broke multiple industry records in live network trial. ADVA also announced that FUNET trialed ADVA FSP 3000 TeraFlex to dramatically expand network capacity and Serverius, one of the Netherlands’ largest data center service suppliers, is leveraging its FSP 3000 TeraFlex terminal to massively increase the capacity of its deployed infrastructure.

Submarine Applications
Cisco is making waves in the subsea market having demonstrated the benefits of the NCS 1004 over a subsea cable in production achieving record results. Cisco and Superloop announced two deployments of up to 400G for 4600km on the INDIGO West cable from Singapore to Australia, and the INDIGO Central cable from Perth to Sydney, featuring a two-fibre pair ‘open cable’ design with new spectrum sharing technology.

Oh What a Year – But the Show Must Go On
As NGON & DCI World and ECOC go virtual this year, I am looking forward to presenting in the following two panels. I hope to see many of you online and from all of us at Acacia…stay safe and healthy and have a great rest of the year.

• NGON & DCI World on Dec 1 at 9:00 am ET: “Next Generation Optics for Increased Capacity”
• ECOC Market Focus on Dec 7 at 17:00 CET: “A Path to Next Generation Coherent”

Contact us if you would like to schedule a meeting with myself or one of my colleagues.

Submarine cable networks are critical pieces to the global flow of network data. It is estimated that these cables carry 99 percent of all international communications traffic such as voice, data and video.  While submarine cables were traditionally owned by telecom carriers, it’s been the content providers themselves, such as Google, Facebook, Microsoft and Amazon that have started investing in the build-out of new undersea cables in recent years.  They are doing this to ensure they can meet the explosive demand for more internet bandwidth which is being driven by their services such as cloud and streaming media. Key to meeting this demand is the use of fiber optics technology and advanced coherent transmission systems in both new and older cables.

Fiber Optic Cables
The main advantage to fiber optic cables under the sea is that they allow large amounts of data to be transmitted very fast.  For example, if you want to stream a video, that video is converted to light so that it can be transported across a fiber optic cable.  Before it reaches its destination, it gets converted back to video.  While that process sounds simple, the technology behind it is amazingly complex and took years of development from optical component vendors, network equipment manufacturers, telecommunications carriers, and many others.

A good example of a fiber optic cable is MAREA, a 4,000 mile cable system built by Microsoft, Facebook and Telxius that crosses the Atlantic Ocean, connecting the United States to southern Europe. Completed in 2017, this massive 10-million pound cable is located 17,000 feet under sea in some places, and runs between Virginia Beach, Virginia and Bilbao, Spain. The MAREA cable features an open design and advanced coherent transmission system that allows it to evolve over time to enable the adoption of new technologies. Last December, the first 400G single carrier DWDM transmission was achieved on the 6,600 km Marea submarine cable.  This was significant because it demonstrated that improvements in capacity and spectral efficiency can enable increased utilization of deployed fiber and improved network capacity. To put into perspective how significant 400G transmission was on a submarine cable, think about the process of downloading all 8 seasons of Game of Thrones in high definition. Ten years ago using an optical cable at 10G, it would take about an entire day.  However, on a fiber optic cable running 400G, it would only take seconds to download. Higher speed is one of the reasons content service providers are so motivated to invest in the deployment of fiber optic cables in the ocean.

Another example of a content provider getting into the submarine cable business is Google, which has funded 13 submarine cables in the last ten years. Recently, Google completed a 6,214 mile subsea cable linking the coast of California to Chile. Named Curie, after the renowned Scientist Marie Curie, this cable was the first new cable to land in Chile in almost 20 years and is now the largest single data pipe connecting the country.  The growth of the cloud and internet services is driving the need for increased subsea network capacity and the content providers are setting themselves up for the future by investing in high-speed fiber links.

Future Undersea Developments
Many new fiber optic submarine cables are being installed to connect other parts of the world to the global internet backbone.  Every country wants to participate in the Internet revolution and with exciting new applications emerging such as 5G, the Internet of Things, machine learning, and self-driving cars, the need for higher bandwidth is growing.  Expanding subsea communications has the potential to connect our world like it’s never been connected before.