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ChallengesA consortium comprised of IOCs in Utah aimed to establish a common optical transport infrastructure capable of providing multi-service capabilities and satisfying the increasing bandwidth requirements of its individual members.
Solution
A new optical transport network utilizing ECI Telecom’s XDM® 10-degree ROADM (reconfigurable optical add drop multiplexer) platform and All- Range™ optics with integrated Ethernet and SONET (Synchronous Optical Network) functionality, as wellas ECI’s LightSoft® network management system for shared management capabilities.
Results Using the XDM, Emery was able to deploy a cost-effective infrastructure that can dynamically adapt to the changing demands of the individual consortium members while providing individualized management resources.
Pooling resources to build a scalable statewide optical transport network
A consortium consisting of eight IOCs in Utah, the UFN (Utah Fiber Network) was formed in 2006 to enable small operators to pool their resources and provide services that are otherwise uneconomical to provide on an individual basis — services including Internet backbone, SS7, E911, tandem switching, and IPTV. The UFN recently undertook a project to build an optical transport network for the deployment of advanced high-bandwidth data, video, and voice services to government agencies, healthcare facilities, and educational institutions throughout the state of Utah. To most efficiently serve the needs of the consortium members, the new network needed to be implemented in phases based upon the needs of the individual companies.
Emery Telecommunications & Video, a subsidiary of Emery Telcom (a leading independent local exchange carrier [ILEC] in Utah) and member of the UFN, was responsible for initiating the first phase of the network. The company, along with other members of the UFN, was in search of a solution that would cost effectively provide multi-service capabilities and a common management platform to satisfy increasing bandwidth requirements.
Choosing ECI’s XDM for flexibility and power
After an extensive evaluation process involving ten vendors, Emery/UFN ultimately selected
ECI Telecom’s XDM All-Range multi-degree ROADM platform for its new statewide network. Emery selected the XDM for its ability to provide a flexible and powerful solution combining Ethernet and SONET functionality in a 10-degree WSS (wavelength selectable switch) ROADM system capable of supporting 40x10 Gbps wavelengths over a 300-mile network.
The ECI solution provides Emery with the flexibility necessary to modify and scale its optical, Ethernet, and SONET infrastructure, so it can quickly and cost-effectively respond to local demand in real time. “ECI’s ROADM solution delivers a cost-effective infrastructure that can dynamically adapt to changing subscriber demands, making the Utah Fiber Network a showcase for other independent telephone companies,” said Brock Johansen, CEO of Emery Telecommunications & Video. ”By leveraging the XDM’s integrated long-haul capabilities and multi-service functionality, we can significantly reduce our total network cost while increasing service agility — a win-win situation.”
The solution
The XDM satisfied all of Emery’s key requirements, including support for growing capacity, multi-degree ROADM functionality, high reliability, and robust network management capabilities provided by ECI’s LightSoft network management suite.
With its 40 Gbps design, the XDM provides Emery with the capacity to support its customers’ bandwidth requirements today and tomorrow. ”With its scalable architecture, the XDM allows us to support 2.5G and 10G wavelengths today, with the capability to go all the way up to 40G when necessary,” said Rod Moore, Special Projects Director at Emery Telcom. ”This allows us to quickly and easily deploy new bandwidth-intensive triple-play services as demand dictates.”
Multi-degree ROADM functionality was an especially important factor for Emery, as the UFN utilizes complex network topologies with multiple rings. Said Moore, ”As we looked at our requirements, ROADM became increasingly important to us due to the makeup of the UFN’s topology, which includes several rings as well as several subtending rings. With this type of infrastructure, multi-degree ROADM makes a lot of sense, as it allows you to connect any wavelength or group of wavelengths to any port, enabling economic and simplified expansion of the network.” Moore continued, ”When we began evaluting vendors’
ROADM solutions, many offered only 2- or 4-degree solutions. ECI was the only vendor to offer a 10-degree solution and do so at a competitive price point.”
Another essential requirement for Emery was multi-service capabilities. Although the company currently has a lot of SONET in its network, it is seeing a shift to Ethernet, making the transport of both types of traffic essential. “The XDM provides us with great networking flexibility by being able to efficiently drop DS-3, SONET, and Ethernet from a single ROADM WDM (wavelength division multiplexing) platform,” said Moore. “This means that we can deploy fewer boxes, consuming less rack space and co-location space.”
Emery also saw great value in ECI’s sophisticated auto power-balancing function. “We
were very impressed with the robustness and preciseness of the XDM’s power-balancing capabilities,” said Moore. “Having a system that rapidly and automatically detects and adjusts to changes in the network such as fiber loss or the number of active wavelengths eliminates the need for manual adjustment and tuning, providing significant operational efficiencies and improving network reliability, allowing us to offer the quality of service that our customers require.”
The final component of the new network solution was the network management system. ECI’s LightSoft provides end-to-end multi-layer management for ROADM/WDM, Carrier Ethernet, and SONET and was especially attractive to Emery, as it enables users to be subdivided down to the port level, an absolute requirement in a co-owned/co-managed network environment like the UFN’s. LightSoft’s partitioning capability allows the individual member companies to monitor and control their own circuits and resources without affecting those of the other companies.
Helping Emery grow its business while reducing CAPEX and OPEX
When asked what benefits Emery expects to realize as a result of the ECI solution, Moore responded, “We foresee greater revenue-generating business opportunities as a result of our XDM deployment. In places along our route, large service providers are coming to us with very significant bandwidth demands, and the XDM, with its capacity-on-demand capabilities, provides us with more than enough capacity to serve their needs today and well into the future.”
The increased capacity also enables the UFN member companies to provide new services such as IPTV, which were previously unavailable in rural areas. Said Moore, “With the added bandwidth provided by the XDM, small operators like those in the consortium can now share a head-end signal, lowering their CAPEX and enabling them to get into the IPTV business. For the first time, using the XDM we are able to provide advanced video services to customers in rural Utah.”
Additional CAPEX and OPEX savings resulted from the elimination of several in-line amplification sites, made possible by the XDM’s All-Range functionality, which combines low noise dynamic gain amplification and EFEC (enhanced forward error correction) to enable any site-to-any site connectivity of 10 Gbps wavelengths. ”The XDM allows us to achieve the reach and low noise characteristics normally found in long systems,” said Moore. “So we are able to save on physical building and hardware costs, as well as operationally from a deployment and wavelength management standpoint.”
Emery expects to enjoy other OPEX benefits as well. “With the XDM and its multi-service capabilities, we are able to have simplicity in the network because we don’t have a lot of different boxes to manage,” said Moore. “And LightSoft provides a single network management platform on which we can manage our SONET, Ethernet, and DWDM services, so there is simplicity from a service management perspective too. This was an important consideration for not only Emery, but the consortium as a whole.”
Looking to the future
Over the next year, Emery and other member companies of the UFN are planning to add an additional 15 nodes to their network rings, and Moore expects the consortium’s relationship with ECI to continue to grow. “Our experience with ECI and the XDM has been very, very good. We hope that our relationship with ECI is a long standing one.”
ECI couldn’t be more pleased. “Emery Telcom is one of the driving forces in building a statewide network for the broader benefit of its customers in rural Utah, and ECI is proud to be part of this effort,” said Emanuel Nachum, Vice President Americas Marketing for ECI Telecom. “By selecting ECI’s multi-degree ROADM, Emery and the UFN join a rapidly growing global list of carriers, demonstrating the innovation and leadership necessary in today’s competitive environment.”
About Emery Telcom
Emery Telcom (www.emerytelcom.com) is one of Utah’s leading providers of telecommunications services. Based in Orangeville, Utah, Emery Telcom was formed as a cooperative in 1950 and has since earned industry-wide recognition for its excellence. The telecommunications company serves thousands of telephone customers throughout communities in Carbon, Emery, Grand, and Wayne Counties, providing local and long distance services, Internet access, cable television, and advanced telecommunications such as DSL and other high-speed digital Internet connections.
About Utah Fiber Network, LLC
Utah Fiber Network (UFN) is a Utah limited liability company whose member companies consist of eight of the independent operating companies in Utah. UFN allows its member companies to pool resources and provide services that may have otherwise been uneconomical or cost prohibitive to provide on an individual basis.