Optical Network Technology: Enabling Everything Over IP Networks

Optical Network Technology

The use of high-bandwidth video, multimedia web applications and large-scale file sharing by the U.S. Federal Government is increasingly important to mission success in areas as diverse as battlefield medicine, surveillance, teleconferencing, training, and the delivery of services to citizens. These technologies demand high bandwidth, always-on reliability, rapid deployment and high quality of service; as a result, the bandwidth needs of government networks have increased exponentially.

When addressing its capacity, speed, and quality concerns, the U.S. Federal Government must also focus on achieving the lowest possible total cost of ownership (TCO) by maximizing the re-use of existing infrastructure, minimizing cost and energy requirements on any new build-out, and avoiding conflict with existing network signals.

Historically, the U.S. Federal Government implemented services on separate, dedicated platforms (such as IP or Ethernet) and relied on underlying optical network technology for transport. To respond to the increasing demand for bandwidth and the pressures to reduce expenditures, the government must converge traditional network layers, using optical network technology to create a more tightly coupled network that supports a variety of services.

Therefore, the challenge for the U.S. Federal Government is twofold: first, it must find cost-effective ways to add capacity to its networks that can scale to accommodate current and future applications; and second, it needs better tools for managing those networks remotely, flexibly, and with fewer requirements for physical, onsite intervention.

Everything Over IP

Optical network technology enables the U.S. Federal Government to migrate to an “everything over IP” network. This allows the usage of enterprise-developed applications including VoIP, human resource planning, supply chain, instant messaging, email, remote storage, disaster recovery, IP video and video conferencing, while supporting existing legacy networks such as Time Division Multiplexing (TDM)-based voice applications.

Used to efficiently transport larger amounts of data across a network, optical network technology provides the needed data transmission speed, availability and performance at a lower cost. Optical network technology solutions also help transition from a patchwork of legacy networks to an integrated, cost-effective framework that helps U.S. Federal Government agencies quickly disseminate information.

Optical network technology is widely considered to be the transport medium of choice for mission-critical networks due to its high reliability and transmission capacity, as well as reduced complexity and costs. Optical network technology can transform communications systems from individual network “silos” supporting discrete users and applications to multi-application, multi-user networks that enable instantaneous access to vital information across all locations. These solutions enable the U.S. Federal Government to scale its IP backbone infrastructures and respond to its huge traffic demands without incurring the extra costs associated with expensive routing capacity upgrades.

Optical Network Technology Features and Benefits

Benefits of optical networks include high resiliency, scalability, and ultra-high bandwidth as well as transport of legacy TDM-based traffic. It allows an “everything-over-IP” migration strategy where a single network converges general data, secured data, TDM voice, VoIP, video, and sensor traffic while at the same time allowing for expansion of voice and data services to new locations globally.

Optical networking solutions can help provide:

• Secure and reliable high-speed connections between U.S. Federal Government agency sites
• High-speed access to public or private data networks
• Private and Virtual Private Network capabilities leveraging Ethernet
• Storage Area Networking to address critical communications needs (i.e. disaster recovery, business continuity, data replication)
• Dedicated transparent wavelength capabilities

Optical Leadership of LGS Innovations and Alcatel-Lucent

From our early experience in supplying the first SONET solutions for the U.S. Army and Air Force bases to our continued programs for supporting the current and future communication needs of the U.S. Federal Government, LGS Innovations is helping to lead the way for transforming government communication networks.

The optical leadership of LGS Innovations and its parent company, Alcatel-Lucent, is realized through its widely deployed, proven solutions that deliver bandwidth flexibility, service reach, and reliability. As LGS Innovations is solely focused on the U.S. Federal Government, solutions are optimized for high-reliability, rapid provisioning, and total service excellence. We offer a comprehensive range of intelligent, service-aware products that address the U.S. Federal Government’s diversified network transformation scenarios in core/backbone and metro/edge networks.

Optical solutions from LGS Innovations:

• Allow military networks to carry Gigabit Ethernet (GigE) and 10 GigE video, sensory, voice-over-Internet Protocol (VoIP) or other traffic, while supporting legacy applications such as Time Division Multiplexing (TDM) voice
• Provide bandwidth scalability for existing and future application growth through Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM), SONET, 10G and, in the future, 40G support
• Minimize complexity from the core to the network edge, while expanding network functionality and capacity
• Reduce individual application “silos” and help converge all applications and networks onto one core backbone
• Prevent service disruptions with resilient connections to all sites
• Minimize operational complexity through intelligent network design, implementation and management

Alcatel-Lucent has taken a leadership position in the industry as the only supplier to offer deployable 100G solutions in both the IP and optics domains. Because Alcatel-Lucent offers both 100G optical transport and 100G Ethernet technologies, LGS Innovations can provide government agencies with significantly higher integration, everything over IP networks, and network coverage for the lowest operational costs and power consumption.

LGS Innovations has a vast heritage that includes the development of generations of optical products:

• Alcatel-Lucent and Bell Labs continue to deploy a wide array of research talent to enable advanced optical network technology solutions
• Bell Labs has developed more than 2,500 patents in optical technology
• As the original innovator in optical networking, Bell Labs has pioneered new standards for SONET and 40 Gbps technology to efficiently transport Ethernet, IP Networks and legacy traffic with high reliability and low latency

Influencing Key Everything Over IP Standards

Alcatel-Lucent is actively involved in the optical technology standards community. Alcatel-Lucent helped spearhead development of ASON/GMPLS control plane specifications across all relevant standards and industry groups. Alcatel-Lucent continues to serve as a key player in the ITU-T development of ASON Recommendations and IETF GMPLS protocol extensions targeted to support the optical control plane. Alcatel-Lucent is also a leading member of the Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF) and has spearheaded the definition of implementation agreements critical for interworking among vendors, including work on UNI and E-NNI specifications. Alcatel-Lucent has participated in every OIF interworking event from early independent lab tests of draft standards and agreements to global, multicarrier interoperability tests of customer-driven services scenarios.

Optical Customer Successes

LGS Innovations successfully completed the European Dense Wave Division Multiplexed – Optical Transport Network (DWDM-OTN), connecting 15 U.S. Army installations in Germany. This project was a 3.5 year effort to design, deploy and system test an installation information infrastructure in Europe that links the forward-deployed soldiers to worldwide Command and Control (C2) and information systems.

The project was managed by the U.S Army’s Product Manager Defense Communications Systems Europe (PM DCS -E) located at Funari Barracks in Mannheim, Germany. PM DCS-E is a subordinate organization to PM Network Service Center (PM NSC) and Program Executive Office Enterprise Information Systems (PEO EIS).

“We are always working to find new, better and more effective ways to give the warfighter the best capabilities and solutions possible,” said LTC Joseph Dupont. “As we continue to provide ‘Everything Over IP’ in Europe, we needed a more robust network capable of supporting real time services and unified capabilities such as Voice over IP, IP video streaming and conferencing. DWDM provides that robust network.”

The DWDM-OTN Network project, awarded in the spring of 2006, consisted of three DWDM rings spanning some 2,100 kilometers connecting 15 access locations supporting Army installations throughout Germany, Italy and Belgium. The U.S. Army selected the Alcatel-Lucent Metropolis Wavelength Services Manager (WSM) for implementing the rings which can provide up to forty 10 Gbps (gigabits per second) of transmission capacity each.

“This project demonstrates our ability to deliver full-scale communications solutions that include both products and multi-vendor network integration services that meet our customers’ needs,” said Ron Iverson, CEO, LGS Innovations. “We work in lock step with our customers throughout every phase of the project to ensure the network not only meets, but exceeds their expectations.”

The LGS Innovations network integration team worked closely with the U.S. Army program manager to design and implement the middleware portion of the transport network, which provides Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) services. The middleware system consists of MPLS/IP routers, and encryption devices that connect I3MP, Army Communities of Interests (COINs) and Legacy networks to the DWDM-OTN network.  The middleware network allows the Army to consolidate or eliminate legacy systems in the region and continues the transformation from a TDM to IP network centric architecture.

LGS Innovations’ responsibilities also included designing and implementing a state-of-the-art, secured out-of-band (OOB) management system that allows an alternate capability to securely configure all OTN network elements, troubleshoot and resolve network problems.