Polatis to demo SDN-enabled optical circuit switching at ECOC 2013

Optical switch specialist Polatis, Inc. says it will host a live demonstration of a hybrid packet/optical circuit-switching enabled by software-defined network (SDN) at the ECOC Exhibition in London, September 23–25. The demo will feature the new Series 6000 Lite 48x48 optical switch, which will be launched at the show.

Developed jointly with the High Performance Networks Group at the University of Bristol, the demonstration will show the efficiency benefits of hybrid packet-optical circuit switching architectures for dynamic management of large flows in data center applications such as virtual machine migration.

The ability to virtualize the physical network linking distributed data centers appears to be a popular goal in the industry right now, judging from the number of recent demonstrations (see “Demo highlights OpenFlow-based virtualized optical transmission” and “Intune Networks demos VM migration using SDN-based optical switch”).

"Unified software control of the physical layer is a key requirement for next-generation networks", said Professor Dimitra Simeonidou, head of the High Performance Networks Group at the University of Bristol. "Adding SDN support to Polatis optical circuit switches brings dynamic reconfigurability to optical systems and enables us to explore new programmable architectures for efficient, high-capacity telecom and data center networks."

The Series 6000 family of optical circuit switches are the first optical crossconnects on the market to offer an embedded OpenFlow interface, enabling seamless integration with SDN control planes, the vendor adds. The Polatis Series 6000 adds transparent, flexible, dark fiber connectivity for up to 192x192 fiber ports with less than 1dB typical loss and negligible impact on transmission budgets.

"We are excited about the close collaboration with the University of Bristol, which has allowed us to accelerate our technology developments to support the emerging SDN market," said Gerald Wesel, CEO Polatis, Inc. "Our customer response to the Series 6000 in the last twelve months has been phenomenal. The addition of SDN support across our full product range brings dynamic optical layer connectivity with outstanding performance to the software-defined data center".

Polatis will also be launching its new Series 6000 Lite 48x48 optical circuit switch. The company says the new switch is the first in the market to fit in just 1U of rack height with a typical optical loss of less than 1dB and better than 50-dB back reflection.

The Series 6000 Lite also features an OpenFlow interface for seamless integration in an SDN by system integrators, network equipment manufacturers, and content providers, enabling optical layer reconfiguration on demand to deploy capacity where it is most needed and reducing costs by making more productive use of network resources.

The Series 6000 Lite 48x48 optical switch will be shipping in Q1 2014.

Visit Polatis at booth 630 to see the new 48x48 optical switch featuring in the SDN demonstration.

For more information on optical switches and suppliers, visit the Lightwave Buyer’s Guide.