China Telecom, Huawei complete industry's 400GE tests

NEW DELHI:China Telecom Guangzhou's Research Institute and Huawei have completed industry's first 400 Gigabit Ethernet (400GE) test,  and it indicate next-generation large-capacity port technology 400GE possesses the qualities required for commercial deployment.

With the rapid development of HD video, cloud computing, and other services, backbone network traffic has experienced average annual growth of over 45%, creating challenges for backbone network bandwidth. As the next-generation port technology, 400GE can significantly increase backbone network bandwidth to help carriers cope with the explosive growth of data traffic.

Currently, international standards organizations are accelerating development work on 400GE standards, which are expected to be released by year-end 2017. In 2016, China Telecom Guangzhou Research Institute and Huawei established a 400GE joint innovation R&D team to develop live-network service requirements, application scenarios, standards formulation, and technology R&D, driving the standardization and commercial use of medium-and-long distance 400GE port technology.

Test results verified 400GE port functions such as line-speed forwarding, multi-service stacking, and fault reporting. The test was performed in China Telecom's network and terminal key laboratory using test cases based on actual network applications. The expert team at the Guangzhou Research Institute was responsible for sorting out network requirements, test-case design, and the process of the all-round test.

Huawei backbone routers were used in the test, and 400GE port networking was used between devices and the tester. Under real-world network traffic conditions, at full bandwidth, 400GE ports experienced zero packet loss in line-speed forwarding. Multi-service stack tests showed that protocol-based forwarding was normal; bundled 400GE and 100GE ports could implement precise load balancing; the transmission distance was as far as 10 km; and loopback and fault reporting functions were normal.

"High-speed traffic growth has contributed to the rapid development of high-speed port technology," said Zhu Yongqing, IP technology research owner at China Telecom Guangzhou’s Research Institute.

"In the final release of the 400GE technology standard, China Telecom Guangzhou Research Institute and Huawei performed the world’s first 400GE port tests based on requirements of the live network, realizing a combination of network requirements and technical R&D. The test results reached expectations. In the future, we will cooperate with Huawei and other partners to promote development of the 400GE industry and maturation of the supply chain, ultimately driving the development of China Telecom’s network and the national broadband infrastructure," added Yongqing.

"This joint venture with China Telecom Guangzhou Research Institute has officially opened up the possibility of commercial use for 400GE single ports," said Chen Jinzhu, General Manager of Huawei’s Backbone Router Domain.

"Moving forward, we will focus on customer requirements and spare no effort in core technologies. Our innovative solutions can assist carriers in seizing development opportunities as we enter the cloud era," added Jinzhu.