XVI Days of Light: trends and transformations in the network sector
The idea of open network systems is promising, but its implementation on a large scale faces many obstacles — according to the expert debate held on 17 October during the XVI Days of Light in Warsaw.
Representatives from Orange, Netia, Play Group, Salumanus and DCN Europe discussed the challenges of network development, interoperability, cost savings and the business case of IP-over-DWDM and open ROADM systems. The debate was led by the organizers of the Days of Light: Marcin Bała, CEO of Salumanus and Jarosław Gorczowski, CEO of DCN Europe.
The conversation coincided with the opening of the long-awaited auction of the 5G band, so it naturally began with a question about the readiness of operators to support more bands and roll up old, copper connections. Representatives of the operators confirmed that although the old technologies consume energy, take up a lot of space and require numerous repairs, they are still very good, because they give the impression that they are free. Despite the fact that their cost of maintenance is much higher than that of new technologies.
- The direction is clear. We are all aware that fiber opens up many possibilities whether we are talking about shared systems or dedicated links. Where we cannot reach with fiber, we are already able to offer wireless connectivity based on 5G network — pointed out unequivocally Kamil Schild, Head of B2B Product at PLAY Group.
In turn Paweł Śmiechowski, Head of the ORANGE Network Development Department confirmed that Orange has been using IP-over-DWDM solutions for many years, which in their opinion are much cheaper and take up less space than traditional transponder-based wave propagation systems.
Bartłomiej Zaremba, Network Development and Maintenance Director at Netia He was a little more skeptical of these types of systems in the core part of the network, while emphasizing that he sees their potential in the data center, distribution and access networks.
Whereas Marcin Bała, CEO of Salumanus He pointed out that talks with large European operators such as Liberty Global indicate that they plan to migrate the entire core network to IP-over-DWDM technology. — Today, no one needs to be persuaded to save money from IP-over-DWDM. There is only the question of centralized management of the IP and optical network. All-over-IP topics are popping up that can help you get rid of the challenges of Alien Lambdas. The idea is that the services sold to customers are based exclusively on IP, so as not to sell the classic OTN or the classic Alien Lambdy Marcin Bała pointed out.
A large part of the discussion was devoted to the idea of open systems: open ROADM or open DWDM. It is an initiative to create open standards for optical networks, which would allow operators to launch and manage new networks more easily and cheaply. Open APIs would allow different devices to communicate with each other in a standard way, regardless of the hardware vendor.
To what extent is this currently possible? According to the panelists, the idea is worth implementing, although it requires a lot of work on the part of the operator who would decide on such a solution. It would be necessary to have software that would allow communication between the systems of the different vendors. - I think that such a step can be decided by the largest players such as Meta or Amazon, who build their own networks and can expect more from vendors — pointed out Bartłomiej Zaremba from Netia.
The 16th edition of the Days of Light is a conference for telco and data center industry specialists organized by Salumanus and DCN Europe. During 8 lectures, topics related to increased bandwidth and energy savings in networks, but also issues related to managed Wi-Fi, cloud management and testing of new devices were discussed. New energy-efficient coherent optical modules and the latest version of the GBC Photonics Smart Recode Device module programmer were presented.
More photos in our Salumanusowa gallery.