Recently, according to foreign media reports, Nokia has cooperated with Etisalat UAE (brand name etisalat) to demonstrate the fastest Passive Optical Network (PON) speed in the Middle East and Africa region. Nokia Bell Labs' PON proof-of-concept (PoC) demonstration achieves speeds of up to 100 gigabits per second (Gb/s) on a single wavelength - four times faster than today's most advanced networks.
During their long-term collaboration, the two technology companies have achieved a number of industry firsts, including the world's first single-carrier terabit-per-second field trial, setting an optical transmission capacity record for the UAE's e&fiber network on etisalat.
To achieve 100 Gb/s on a single wavelength, Nokia Bell Labs used pioneering digital signal processing (DSP) technology. Once advanced DSPs are adopted, the steps to 50G and 100G are simple, with 100G commercially available in the 2030s.
The Nokia Bell Labs 100G PON prototype is the world's first application of flexible rate transmission in a PON network. Flexible rate transmission works by grouping optical fiber modems (ONUs) with similar physical network characteristics (such as loss or dispersion) to improve data transmission efficiency. Using flexible rate transport reduces latency on the PON and cuts power consumption in half—two fundamental characteristics of fiber optic networks, which play a rapidly growing role in the mass delivery of fixed and mobile broadband services.
The head of Etisalat UAE said that fiber optic networks are rapidly developing into the fulcrum of the entire telecom industry, playing an important role in delivering any service to any endpoint, including residential, business and cellular base stations. As use cases evolve, fiber optic networks must become faster, smarter and more cost-effective.
The PoC is Nokia's latest optical access industry first, following XGS-PON, TWDM-PON and 25G PON. 100G PON may be commercially available in the 2030s.
