What is coherent routing?

There’s a surge of new services, content, and applications being created and consumed at the network edge by both business and residential customers. This is driving new and unpredictable traffic patterns across access and aggregation networks—and metro networks must be ready to absorb all this demand. As a result, operators must find a way to rapidly and cost-effectively scale their metro networks to address surges in bandwidth demand and deliver a faster time to market for new services. To achieve this, many operators are considering converging their IP and optical layers. In fact, according to a recent study, 87 percent of providers view IP/Optical convergence as important for their next-generation networks.*

Initial industry thinking around IP/Optical convergence primarily focused on collapsing the IP and optical layers of the network—simply putting a coherent plug in a router. But successful IP/Optical convergence requires more than that. It takes a comprehensive approach that’s driven by multi-layer operations and includes an intelligent programmable optical layer. Without multi-layer visibility and automation, operators are significantly limited in their ability to plan, troubleshoot, and dynamically move traffic flows in a converged architecture. The result is less than optimal network performance and a poor customer experience.

Ciena’s Coherent Routing
Ciena takes a holistic approach to coherent routing, with a strategic focus on multi-layer operations—the key to unlocking your IP/Optical convergence success.

Ciena’s Coherent Routing combines the best of Ciena technology, including:

• Purpose-built coherent routers, including the 5132, 5164, 5166, 5169, 5171, 8110, 8112, 8114, 8140, 8190 and WaveRouter^TM.
• A next-gen IP network operating system
• Industry-leading WaveLogic^TM 6 Nano and WaveLogic^TM 5 Nano coherent pluggables
• Fully-instrumented, use-case-optimized photonic line systems, including Coherent ELS and 6500 Reconfigurable Line System (RLS)

But we didn’t stop there. On the cutting edge of multi-layer operations, our solution takes IP/Optical convergence to the next level. Ciena’s Manage, Control and Plan (MCP) provides integrated planning and powerful analytics that span network layers. In a single pane of glass, Ciena’s Coherent Routing Solution allows you to easily manage your converged network and optimize performance.

Our Coherent Routing is also designed to improve sustainability by leveraging Ciena’s continuous investment to improve the power and footprint efficiencies of our Routing and Switching and Optical platforms. The result is a simplified, converged network that is also environmentally friendly.