CALIENT Technologies, a provider of photonic switching technology, has forged an alliance with Cyan, a provider of software-based packet optical transport systems for business Ethernet, to deploy a 10Gbps fiber optic network at Minnesota Telecom's Northeast Service Cooperative (NESC).

NESC is a nonprofit public corporation serving eight counties in Northeast Minnesota. The corporation has received $43.5 million from a federal broadband stimulus award under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act through the USDA's Rural Utilities Service. The high-speed network is expected to deliver a wide range of data services to customers in rural Northeast Minnesota.

"The Northeast Service Cooperative is a key regional resource for education, health care, information technology and economic development in Northeast Minnesota," said Paul Brinkman, executive director of NESC and CEO of Minnesota Telecom, in a statement.

"Our mission to bring much-needed high speed data services to such a diverse, rural area has been a collaborative effort among our members and partners,” Brinkman added. “The flexibility and scalability of the Cyan/CALIENT network solution uniquely solves the challenges of this project and we're excited to be the first application to successfully deploy this architecture."

The partnership between Cyan and CALIENT has created industry’s first colorless, directionless, contentionless (CDC) reconfigurable optical add-drop multiplexer (ROADM (News - Alert)) using 3D MEMS photonic switching technology. The NESC CDC ROADM leverages Cyan's Z-Series packet-optical transport system and CALIENT's new S320 3D MEMS photonic switch.

Cyan's Z77 packet-optical transport platform includes highly advanced wavelength selectable switch (WSS) -based, reconfigurable optical add/drop multiplexers (ROADMs) and a range of Ethernet, SONET, and OTN service modules. NESC will also use Cyan 360 software-defined operations systems to manage the entire network, including CALIENT's photonic switches for a fully integrated solution.

The combined solution delivers complete remote management, provisioning and testing capabilities, allowing NESC to leverage its resources to support the entire network spanning 14 network nodes and 915 fiber miles.

With NESC's CDC ROADM network, organizations can provision high-bandwidth connectivity to any anchor site in its service area and provision new services or change customer bandwidth levels on the fly based on demand.

"Service provider networks today need the capacity and connectivity that our 3D MEMS technology can deliver, and with the S320 we now offer that technology in a power efficient, small platform that can be remotely managed," said Atiq Raza, chairman and CEO of CALIENT, in a statement.

"The deployment of photonic switching in the NESC network is an excellent example for other regional service providers of an application where remote unmanned network operation and accompanying low OPEX (News - Alert) is a major benefit."

"Cyan's Z-Series platforms and Cyan 360 software-defined operations systems were designed to seamlessly integrate multi-vendor solutions for precisely this type of service innovation," said Michael Hatfield, president of Cyan, in a statement. "The integration of Cyan and CALIENT products to operationalize the industry's first colorless, directionless, contentionless (CDC) ROADM network puts NESC at the forefront of services innovation.”

In another related development, tw telecom (News - Alert) has been awarded a multi-year contract with DeCrescente Distributing Company in Mechanicville. As part of the pact, tw telecom will provide DeCrescente, a leading beverage distributor in the Capital Region, with managed Business Ethernet and converged services including voice and data capabilities and Internet access.