Internet Exchange (IX) operators DE-CIX, LINX, AMS-IX and BCIX have teamed up to launch a new generation of optical transceiver, the 100G LR-1 (referred to as LR), to their platforms, beginning in Frankfurt, London, Amsterdam, and Berlin.
Legacy 100G LR-4 technology uses four lasers, each carrying a signal of 25Gb/s, while 100G LR technology uses only a single laser, leveraging pulse amplitude modulation (PAM4) to transmit data at 100Gb/s.
The reduction in transceiver design complexity of the 100G LR technology could potentially result in power savings as well as more competitive transceiver pricing. The companies believe that the advances not only provide advantages in the short to mid-term but could also unlock new transceiver form factors, opening up the potential for even greater performance and efficiency improvements in the future.
The 100G LR technology is already available with a wide range of compatible routers from major vendors and is compatible with current fibre technology.
Thomas King, Chief Technology Officer at DE-CIX says: “With the new 100G LR technology, we are paving the way for the next generation of transceiver technology that will dominate the market for years to come. The future design of our DE-CIX interconnection platform will not only bring better programmability and higher scalability, commercial flexibility, and wider geographical reach, it will also make interconnection even easier for our customers through simplified technical processes.”
Richard Petrie, CTO at LINX adds: “For LINX, we will be enabling our London locations first after approving the solution in our lab. We will roll out as demand grows and as we see that LINX members need support in the shift to the improved optics. This will realise both benefits in cost and power for us and the LINX member base.”
Ruben van den Brink, CTO at AMS-IX says: “Offering 100G LR makes perfect sense, both for AMS-IX and for its customers. The lab tests proved that the new optics can be used for all the switches that are currently deployed in our Amsterdam points-of-presence (PoPs). I appreciate the fact that we were able to collaborate with our partners in pushing this new standard. When Internet Exchanges join efforts, customers benefit, so I hope many more exchanges will start offering 100G LR soon.”
André Grüneberg, CTO at BCIX concludes: “After testing 100G LR and other 100G single-lambda standards in our lab, we have already introduced this new technology into our production network. By doing so we have built a very cost-efficient interconnection between data centres on the same campus. Offering the same benefits to our peers is just the next logical step.”
