Windstream Wholesale has transmitted a 1 terabit per second (Tbps) wavelength over a 1,100 km link on multiple routes on its Intelligent Converged Optical Network (ICON).
Cisco and Acacia (which Cisco acquired in 2021) worked with Windstream on the trial deployments. They included transport of 1 Tbps over 1,100 km from Miami to Jacksonville, Fla.; transport of 800G over 1,387 km of mixed fiber from Miami through Tallahassee, Fla., to Atlanta; and roundtrip transport of 600G over 2,774 km between Miami and Atlanta.
Windstream says the trial deployments prove that “disaggregated networking can be implemented successfully on production networks and demonstrated that interoperability between a vendor’s transponder and a third-party line system is achievable.”
John Nishimoto, Windstream Wholesale’s senior vice president of products, marketing and strategy, said in a prepared statement, “We developed ICON to provide multi-vendor flexibility and seamlessly integrate the newest optimized technology into our disaggregated network. Achievements like this reinforce our 800G wave strategy and offer improved design and network planning options among our 100G and 400G solutions.”
The trial deployments used Cisco NCS 1014 C-Band 2.4T WDM Transponder Line Card with Acacia’s Coherent Interconnect Module (CIM) 8, which Windstream says is the industry’s first 1.2 Tbps faceplate pluggable coherent solution.
Windstream and Cisco/Acacia previously made three related announcements.
- In February 2021, the companies deployed a 400G per second single-wavelength transmission over 1,027 km between Phoenix and Los Angeles.
- In April 2022, they established 400G links in a production environment over a 1,027 km route.
- In March 2023, they deployed a 1Tbps wave over 541 km between Dallas and Tulsa.
Windstream is not the only service provider working with Cisco/Acacia. On November 1, 2023, the two companies and Verizon sent 1.2 Tbps on a single wavelength through the carrier’s live network on Long Island, N.Y.
