Touting the development as an industry first in the U.S., Verizon said it has deployed 100-Gigabit-per-second technology on a portion of its backbone network -- connecting Chicago and New York -- with an ultra-long-haul optical system from Ciena.
The telco said it plans to deploy the technology on more than 10 routes before the end of 2011, including Sacramento to Los Angeles and Minneapolis to Kansas City. Verizon is using Ciena's 100G coherent optical transport solution, which the telco used for its 100-Gbps deployment in Europe linking Paris and Frankfurt earlier this year.
Other U.S. service providers, including Comcast and AT&T, have said they also are building out 100-Gbps backbone connections.
Verizon said the 100-Gbps backbone links significantly reduce latency and carry 10 times more network traffic per fiber. The technology also provides efficiencies by carrying traffic on a single 100-Gig wavelength as opposed to 10 wavelengths each operating at 10 Gigabits per second.
"We're seeing not only growth in traffic, but also in the need for immediacy from our customers that are managing financial transactions, health-care data exchange, energy services and entertainment on-the-go," Verizon vice president of global network planning Ihab Tarazi said in a statement.
In November 2007, Verizon completed the industry's first field trial of 100-Gbps optical traffic on a live system. Last year the telco conducted a field trial transmitting high bit-rate technologies, including 100G, 450G and 1T (1 Terabit per second), coexisting on the same fiber.
