Small Window of Opportunity Likely for Metro 40G

While by far the most common transport unit in the metro is 10G, probably the largest application for metro 40G will be in connecting routers together that have 40G interfaces.  There are also specific cases in which the carrier will be absolutely out of spectrum on the fiber, in which it is impossible to add any more 10G wavelengths.  Rather than lighting up another fiber, the service provider can begin to use 40G wavelengths to get better density.
 

One of the key questions is whether metro 40G will be more of an afterthought just as OC-12 with SONET had been, with a rather quick jump to OC-48.  There are reasons to believe that a metro application could be a big deal, but perhaps only for a while.   The new 40GbE is probably going to be driven by data centers as well as video, server and storage applications, as opposed to necessarily being deployed by the carriers.  While IP will still be there, the key matter will be the bandwidth requirements of the applications that ride over the protocol.   Still, in many cases in which large enterprises are looking for redundancy, the use of 40G by the telcos is likely to come into play. However, if 100G were to all of a sudden get into a competitive pricing situation, the model in the metro could theoretically be changed.   For more information on this topic, please see the latest issue in our 40/100 Gigabit Network Strategies Monthly, “Metro 40G.”  The report can be purchased directly from GLG.    

Samuel Greenholtz consults with leading institutions through GLG