Huawei Global Optical Summit | Three Trends on All-Optical Networks, Promoting Digital Intelligence in the Industry

During Digital & Intelligent APAC Congress 2024, Bob Chen, President of Huawei Optical Business Product Line, delivered an opening speech at Global Optical Summit APAC 2024.

In the speech, he noted that optical connectivity and sensing have been the cornerstones of intelligent industry transformation, and shared three trends in the optical industry.

Trend 1: Fiber-in Copper-out

As campus networks embrace the Wi-Fi 7 technology, traditional copper lines need to be replaced by optical fibers, which feature high bandwidth, long service life, and environmental protection. Moreover, one-time cable routing is future-proof for 30 years. Against this backdrop, Fiber-in Copper-out is an inevitable trend in the industry.

Targeting large campuses in industries such as education, healthcare, and manufacturing, Huawei has launched the Huawei FTTO 2.0 Solution to upgrade the bandwidth, networking, and O&M on the live network. Huawei innovatively developed the industry's first XGS-PON Pro technology, which supports ultra-high bandwidth access of 12.5G or 25G services. In addition, the solution supports the E2E hard slicing technology, which enables multi-service bearing over one network without interference, reducing the TCO by 30%. Furthermore, the NCE management platform implements unified management of IP and POL networks, enabling one person to manage an entire campus network.

Huawei launched the all-optical target network for ISPs in the "fiber to the room (FTTR)" era. On the access side, full-scenario home broadband solutions, such as FTTR and Trouble-Free ONT, are used to help ISPs improve user experience and reduce OPEX. On the metro and backbone networks, Huawei's industry-leading 400G OTN products and innovative OptiX Alps-WDM Solution enable ISPs to easily cope with traffic growth on the networks.

Trend 2: fgOTN-in SDH-out

Over the past few decades, SDH has been widely used on industry communication networks due to its high security and reliability. But as digital intelligence continues to ramp up in the industry, the bandwidth limit imposed by SDH has become a bottleneck, creating a need for a next-generation production communication network that supports higher bandwidth as well as high security and reliability.

SDH networks in the electric power and transportation industries are being upgraded and reconstructed with fgOTN-in SDH-out. In December 2023, International Telecommunication Union-Telecommunication Standardization Sector (ITU-T) officially approved the fine grain OTN (fgOTN) standard and defined it as the next-generation technology to replace SDH. Huawei launched the industry's first solution that supports the fgOTN standard to build a solid and highly reliable communication network for the industry.

Trend 3: Optical-Sensing-in Hard-Work-out

In the past, manual on-site operations are required in perimeter inspection scenarios such as railways, airports, and oil and gas pipeline inspection. The efficiency is low, and the working conditions for employees are poor. With the next-generation optical fiber sensing and intelligent analysis, 24/7 accurate smart perimeter inspection and pipeline monitoring solutions can be implemented. The solutions enable employees to move from outdoor sites to offices, improving their working productivity and conditions.

Huawei integrates sensing capabilities of vision, radar, and optical fibers with the advanced intelligent model to build an industry-leading multi-dimensional sensing solution, facilitating production and operations.

As a leader in the optical industry, Huawei continuously explores how to use innovative optical technologies and products to enable industrial intelligence.