The successful trial of the 6,236-kilometer Internet cable should lay a foundation for supporting cloud and AI services.
At issue is the Amitié cable, on which Microsoft and Cisco are collaborating. This cable runs from Boston in the U.S. to Bordeaux in France. To complete the trial, the cable uses Space Division Multiplexing (SDM) technology with 16 fiber pairs. That’s more than other Internet cables use. Repeater power is distributed among the fiber pairs to deliver the high cable capacity.
Cisco and Microsoft say the test exceeds all industry test performance, with a Dense Wavelength Division Multiplexing (DWDM) of 800G in a 150GHz channel spacing. That corresponds to a spectrum efficiency of 5.33 bit/s/Hz and a maximum spectrum efficiency of 5.6 bit/s/Hz.
In addition, 600G was transmitted over 12,469 kilometres for a transatlantic loopback configuration. “This is the first time a 140Gbaud single carrier signal was demonstrated live, and is the longest distance ever reported at single carrier 600G DWDM transmission on an SDM cable,” Cisco said.
Microsoft network
The Amitié cable is now part of the global network supporting Microsoft services. Accordingly, Jamie Gaudette, GM of Cloud Network Engineering at Microsoft, commented, “This field trial demonstrates what is now a commercial technology for subsea routes, and we can improve the network capacity to help drive digital transformation for people, organizations, and industries around the world.”
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