Metro packet optical equipment supplier Infinera (News - Alert) today unveiled new metro and long-haul solutions aimed at addressing the shift from 10gig to 100gig.
That upgrade includes the DTN-X XT Series, a point-to-point solution for long-haul applications. Infinera last year unveiled the Cloud Express for the data center and saw the need for a different form factor – rack and stack vs. chassis-based – and an emerging need to go to several hundred and thousand kilometers.
Infinera today also introduces the DTN-X XTC-2 and XTC-2E 100G platforms optimized for OTN switched metro and regional networks. And it has new WDM interop unified packet-optical for the metro solutions called the TM-Series and DTN-X XTC.
Pravin Majahan, director of product and corporate marketing at Infinera, says the company, which closed its acquisition of Transmode (News - Alert) in August, now has a unified end-to- end portfolio and as a result can address a much larger market than it could as separate companies.
Andrew Schmitt, senior principal analyst at IHS (News - Alert) Technology, agrees. “Infinera can now address the entire WDM market – which we expect to top $15 billion by 2019 — from the edge to the core and across both traditional service provider and internet content provider applications. Infinera and the DTN-X played a major role in the optical reboot from 10 Gb/s to 100 Gb/s in the long-haul core, and the company is well timed to enter the metro portion of the market as it should surge in 2016.”
IHS says optical equipment leaders are Ciena, Cisco (News - Alert), and Infinera. “Ciena is hitting on all cylinders as the second-largest WDM optical equipment provider, seizing market share in 2014 while also making progress in the packet-optical transport domain,” according to the research firm. Cisco’s strong balance sheet and brand give it “first-mover advantage in integration of the IP and optical layers,” according to the firm. Meanwhile, IHS says that Infinera is benefitting from outstanding customer perceptions and large market share gains.
Spending on optical transport solutions was approximately $2.8 billion in the first quarter of this year, according to Dell’ (News - Alert)Oro Group. Growth in this category was driven in part by sales of wavelength division multiplexers, according to the firm, which said this kind of gear comprises 76 percent of the broader category and is growing at a year-over-year rate of 5 percent.
Edited by Kyle Piscioniere