Data center interconnect bandwidth is poised to reach 5,000 Tbps by 2020. That includes double-digit growth in such areas as cloud and IT, energy, and health care.
The ever-expanding need for more bandwidth doesn’t come as a surprise. But there are a few new aspects to data center interconnect growth trends worth noting. That includes the move to more efficient, open, scalable, and transparent solutions.
For example, solutions with coherent plus packet capabilities can allow for transport optimization. Such solutions use packet aggregation and switching to fill wavelengths on DCI networks.
In March IHS (News - Alert) Markit reported that the packet-optical transport system revenue reached $2.5 billion in 2017. That was a 10 percent increased compared to the previous year, it added.
“In the future, as DCI becomes a more important application for optical networks, there will be a pull-through effect for P-OTS platforms,” the research firm reported. “For service providers offering DCI as a service, or offering a mix of dedicated Ethernet and wavelength services for DCI, the ability for P-OTS equipment to support both make it an attractive platform.”
Meanwhile, there’s a move toward more open solutions to enable ease of integration. Open solution also can help network operators avoid vendor lockin. So many solutions suppliers, including those in the DCI space, are providing open application programming interfaces as part of their deliverables.
Scalability is another important thing to look for in a DCI solution. Compact, modular transponder/muxponder solutions go a long way in enabling scalability.
But scalability at the photonic layer is important too. After all, recent reports indicate that hyperscale data centers will use thousands of fiber pairs in the coming years.
To ensure the best end user experiences and resource optimization, organizations need to know what’s happening with their DCI infrastructure. That means having the processes and tools in place to collect, aggregate, analyze, and act on network data. The most advanced tools even allow network operators to predict what will happen next. That way they can address potential problems before they occur.
Edited by Maurice Nagle