Infinera upgrades MENA submarine network

Infinera says it has completed a successful deployment of its DTN-X XTC Series across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) submarine network. The upgrade provides connectivity with MENA's existing terrestrial network and enables MENA to rapidly deploy increments of 100 Gbps of bandwidth to differentiate services and manage costs as the network capacity scales.

MENA, a subsidiary of Orascom Telecom Media and Technology, owns and operates an undersea cable system that links Europe to the Middle East and Southeast Asia. The submarine network provides wholesale capacity to global networks and, with this latest Infinera upgrade, is equipped to provide wholesale carriers with a range of connectivity services from STM-1 at 155 Mbps to 100 Gbps over terabit-capacity cables.

"This subsea network upgrade integrated with MENA's existing terrestrial network enables MENA to deliver bandwidth quickly and efficiently on a critical route between Europe, Middle East, and Arabian Gulf countries," says Kamran Malik, chief executive officer at MENA. "The Infinera DTN-X-XTC series provides robust reliability, flexibility, and scalability, meeting the high standards that MENA seeks. This helps MENA offer wholesale customer bandwidth as needed in 100-Gbit increments."

The MENA subsea-terrestrial network uses the Infinera DTN-X XTC-10, which enables MENA to deliver 100 Gbps of coherent transmission capacity through 500-Gbps superchannels with an upgrade path to terabit superchannels in the future. The product integrates this DWDM superchannel transmission with Optical Transport Network (OTN) and packet switching for sub-wavelength service management.

According to Nick Walden, senior vice president of EMEA at Infinera, the network's new upgrade will allow MENA to provide differentiated wholesale international capacity in its market while supporting future economic growth of the Mediterranean and Middle East markets with on-demand scale and efficiency.

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