Investment and Network Construction Dynamics of Domestic and Foreign
Operators
China Unicom Built the Largest 400G OTN Experiment in Zhejiang Province
Under the planning and guidance of the Network Department of China Unicom, Zhejiang Unicom, and China Unicom Group Research Institute jointly established the largest 400G OTN experimental network in China with Huawei and completed key project validation based on this network, including business functions, performance, protection switching, and application scenarios. Completing this experimental network is an important milestone for 400G to transition from laboratory testing to mature commercial use, fully reflecting China Unicom’s leadership in applying optical transmission network technology. This 400G OTN experimental network covers four major cities in Zhejiang Province, including Hangzhou, Ningbo, Wenzhou, and Taizhou. It adopts industry-leading optical transmission technologies and related equipment such as 400G, Super C120, and OXC, deploys four core nodes and 19 optical amplification stations, and constructs a 400G ROADM/OXC+OTN network that supports access from multiple speed business types from GE to 400GE. The business supports OTN security encryption function, and the project verification content and indicators meet expectations.
Consolidated Bet on Fiber Optic Slowing Down Expansion Speed
Executives at Consolidated Communications, a broadband and commercial communication service provider in the United States, have made optimistic predictions about the company’s prospects, primarily focused on the fiber optic business while lowering expectations for its expansion pace. Consolidated’s newly appointed Chief Financial Officer, Fred Grafham, stated that the company’s strategic business areas – including consumer broadband, commercial, and operator data transmission – have achieved healthy revenue growth, partially offset the decline in revenue from other services such as voice and video. As the company invests in fiber optic infrastructure, these strategic business areas will drive revenue and EBITDA growth by 2024. Consolidated officially launched its strategy to transform into a fiber optic provider in 2021, establishing its subsidiary Fiber and planning to upgrade 70% of its copper infrastructure to gigabit fiber. In 2022, Fiber Fiber added 40100 new fiber users, doubling the number of new users compared to 2021. The company has built 400000 new fiber optic locations, covering over 1 million, accounting for 38% of its target market. As of the end of 2022, Consolidated has approximately 123000 consumer fiber broadband users with a penetration rate of 12%.
AT&T Announces Major Network Milestones in 5G and Fiber Deployment
AT&T stated that the company’s fiber optic and 5G deployments had reached important network milestones by actively expanding coverage, increasing capacity, and enhancing network resilience. Over the past five years (2018-2022), AT&T has mainly invested over $140 billion in wireless and wired networks in the United States, including capital investments and the acquisition of wireless spectrum. AT&T Corporation has the best global coverage among American wireless operators and the largest wireless network in the United States, covering an area of over 2.91 million square miles. This means that in 2022, the operator will add approximately 100000 square miles, equivalent to covering the entire UK. AT&T stated that it has also deployed the most reliable 5G network in the United States, covering a population of 290 million in nearly 24000 towns across the country. In addition, by the end of 2022, over 150 million people can utilize AT&T’s mid-range 5G spectrum, which is more than twice its original goal for the end of 2022. In 2022, AT&T also doubled the number of 5G+venues and airports, bringing superhighways and more connections to some areas of over 50 cities and nearly 70 venues and airports in the United States.
System Equipment Supplier Dynamics
Ciena FY23Q1’s Revenue Exceeded Expectations by $1.057 Billion
In the first quarter of the 2023 fiscal year, Ciena’s revenue was $1.057 billion, compared to $844 million in the same period last year, a year-on-year increase of 25.1%. The gross profit margin in the first quarter of the fiscal year 2023 was 43.2%, compared to 45.5% in the same period last year, a year-on-year decrease of 2.3%. Net income for the first quarter of the fiscal year 2023 was $76.241 million, with earnings per share of $0.51. Net income for the same period last year was $45.823 million, with earnings per share of $0.3.
From a business perspective, in the first quarter of the fiscal year 2023, sales revenue from online platforms was $855 million, a year-on-year increase of 36.47%. Sales revenue from platform software and services was $73.4 million, a year-on-year increase of 1.24%. Sales revenue from global services was $113 million, a year-on-year decrease of 9.05%.
From a regional market perspective, the sales revenue from the American market in the quarter was 765 million US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 28.57%; The sales revenue from the EMEA market was 153 million US dollars, a year-on-year increase of 1.33%; The sales revenue from the Asia Pacific market was $139 million, a year-on-year increase of 40.71%.
Looking ahead, Ciena expects its revenue to reach between $1.035 billion and $1.115 billion in the second quarter of the 2023 fiscal year. The gross profit margin for the first fiscal quarter is expected to be 40% lower. The annual revenue for the fiscal year 2023 will increase by 20% -22%. The adjusted gross profit margin for the fiscal year 2023 ranges from 42% to 44%.
Ekinops Received €1.29 Million in Funding to Collaborate with Orange on the 5Geneva Project
EKINOPS announced that it had received official approval from the Office of the French Prime Minister to fund 1.29 million euros to support its collaboration with Orange in developing the 5Geneva project. The 5Geneva project lasts 36 months and aims to develop a platform for business participants (vertical industries) and telecom operators to test 5G use cases at the network’s edge. These platforms use on-site network devices such as pCPE (Physical Customer Premise Device) and uCPE (Universal CPE). Engineering applications act as containers or virtual machines (VMs). Provide open experiments to external companies to test the advantages of 5G using multiple configurations, including 5G dedicated networks. As part of the France Balance program, Ekinops has received 3.6 million euros from the French government to promote the development of its Next Generation Optical Network Electronic Equipment (NGOpt) project, focusing on high-speed optical transmission solutions. 5Geneva continues this approach by combining Ekinops’ expertise in on-site device development with Orange’s expertise in 5G, virtualization, and integration. Its goal is to deploy new solutions based on containerization and virtualization capabilities to promote the launch of internal services within the company. The project also seeks to realize on-demand local deployment of business services by utilizing edge computing and 5G infrastructure. This project offers many possibilities for enhanced business solutions, providing data security, resource availability, customized service quality, and agile deployment.
Hisense Broadband, Lumentum, KDDI, and Viettel Join the Open XR Forum
The Open XR Forum announced that Hisense Broadband, KDDI, Lumentum, and Viettel had joined industry initiatives to leverage industry-defined XR optical pluggable transceiver technology to promote the deployment of software configurable point-to-point and point-to-point multi-point coherent optical networks. The new members, including network operators and equipment suppliers, have brought diverse professional knowledge to the Open XR ecosystem, strengthening the growing interest in software-defined optical transmission networks implemented by XR optical pluggable transceiver technology. Their contributions and participation in the forum will promote multi-vendor, interoperability solutions to achieve high bandwidth and software configurable coherent optics from the core to the network’s edge. The Open XR Forum is an MSA alliance that brings together network operators, equipment suppliers, and component suppliers dedicated to building the foundation of next-generation coherent optical solutions to meet the needs of greater network scalability and flexibility cost-effectively. XR Optics is the industry’s first coherent optical solution that addresses network operators’ access and aggregation challenges due to inconsistencies between network traffic patterns and the technologies used to transmit traffic.
Nokia, Qualcomm, and T-Mobile Achieved the Industry’s First 5G Operator Aggregation
Nokia, Qualcomm Technologies, and T-Mobile announced that they have successfully aggregated 5G independent (SA) spectrum using 5CC Carrier aggregation (5CC CA) in the sub-6 GHz spectrum, the first demonstration in the world. The successful test aggregated two FDDs and three TDD carriers, resulting in a 5G Carrier aggregation with a peak downlink throughput speed of more than 4.2Gbps 5CC, enabling mobile operators to provide more customers with higher data rates and better coverage. These two companies are industry leaders in Carrier aggregation technology. The 5CC CA call was made on the Nokia AirScale base station and the mobile test equipment supported by the new Snapdragon X75 5G modem RF system (the world’s first modem RF solution supporting 5G 5x Carrier aggregation). During the testing process, the five component carriers on the FDD frequency bands n71 (600MHz) and n25 (1900MHz), as well as the TDD frequency bands n41 (2.5GHz) and n77 (3.7GHz), were aggregated. Using 5G uplink Carrier aggregation in the n25 and n77 bands also speeds up the uplink data rate. The combination of uplink and downlink Carrier aggregation enables operators to balance uplink and downlink data rates. By aggregating 5CC, mobile network operators have more options to utilize their spectrum and network assets to achieve a better user experience. As users migrate to 5G, network operators can use an increasing number of 5G FDD frequencies and combine these operators with the bandwidth of multiple intermediates (TDD) operators. 5CC CA unleashes this potential without affecting coverage and capacity.
Huawei and Saudi Telecom (STC) Sign a Memorandum of Understanding on All-Optical Strategic Cooperation, Accelerating the Move Towards F5.5G
Saudi Telecom Company (STC) has signed a memorandum of cooperation with Huawei to build an all-optical strategic partnership towards the F5.5G era, which includes consensus and product and solution cooperation under the F5G and F5.5G industry standards. The memorandum of cooperation aims to help STC build an all-optical infrastructure network that meets the requirements of ultra-large bandwidth, ultra-high speed, quality experience, and automatic driving and realize the prosperity of fixed network business while accelerating the implementation of the Digital transformation strategy. In September 2022, ETSI released the Fixed 5th Generation Advanced and Beyond white paper, defining the core capabilities of F5.5G. The F5.5G era has brought four major changes: the user experience has reached 10Gbps: F5.5G introduces next-generation technologies such as FTTR, Wi-Fi 7, 50G PON, and 800G, achieving ubiquitous 10Gbps; Business boundaries beyond connectivity: Fiber optic sensing technology is applied in scenarios such as fire and earthquake warning, gas detection, and water quality detection; Network security: upgrading from telecom level to industrial level, accelerating industrial digital upgrading; Network is more environmentally friendly: Fiber optic transmission technology can reduce energy consumption by 90% compared to EXC, and all-optical access technology can reduce energy consumption by 80% compared to copper. Huawei and STC will strengthen cooperation in areas such as 50G PON, FTTR, OXC, metropolitan pooling wavelength division, wavelength division 400G/800G, and ultra-high speed 1.2T in the future, including technical research, testing, commercial deployment, and promotion. They will also form a joint team to innovate in the F5.5G field. Huawei stated that it would fully support the construction of the STC fixed network. At the same time, STC is willing to join standards or industry organizations, such as ETSI/WBBA, to enhance STC’s industry influence while providing value cases, technologies, and architectures for the F5.5G standard.
Adtran Showcases Coherent 100ZR QSFP28 Demonstration at OFC
Adtran is a leading provider of next-generation open and decomposed network solutions, announcing its successful demonstration of coherent 100ZR technology on OFC, showcasing the industry’s first real-time demonstration of 100ZR QSFP28 pluggable operation on a DWDM metropolitan area ring. This demonstrates how operators can benefit from efficient and cost-effective deployment of 100Gbit/s consistent services with low power consumption and zero footprints. This experiment used multi-vendor OFCnet network settings, with devices at the Adtran booth, Coherent Corp., and OFCnet booth. Adtran’s coherent 100ZR is explicitly designed for the edges of optical networks. With its QSFP28 overall size and power grid, it can easily and economically upgrade to 100Gbit/s data rate by directly plugging into existing front end, switches, and routers. It provides various deployment options, from local switches and central offices to harsh outdoor conditions like street cabinets. These advantages are attributed to the unique features of the transceiver, including cost, space, and power-optimized DSP explicitly designed for 100ZR. This new DSP, jointly developed by Adtran and Coherent, is unique in the market. Adtran is also developing low-power silicon photonics integrated circuits to achieve faster and more energy-efficient solutions in various applications.
Corning Achieves 2400 km 400G Transmission Records Through Infinira ICE-X QSFP-DD Coherent Pluggable Technology
Infinira announced that it had achieved 400 gigabits per second (400G) single wavelength transmission across 2400 kilometers of Corning TXF fiber through the Infinira ICE-X 400G QSFP-DD intelligent, coherent pluggable solution. The transmission distance of this experiment is twice that recorded before. The success of Infinira and Corning’s 400G transmission demonstration highlights that this cost-effective solution can solve many applications, enabling network operators to meet the growing bandwidth demand better. This demonstration showcases Infinira’s ICE-X 400G intelligent, coherent pluggable solution in UfiSpace’s 400G and edge routers, spanning 2400 kilometers of Corning TXF fiber, an ultra-low loss silicon core fiber with a large effective area. The demonstration utilizes advanced features supported by the Infinira ICE-X intelligent, coherent pluggable series, including integrated system-level intelligence, programmable modulation, adjustable baud rate, efficient spectrum utilization, and 0 dBm transmission power. Robert Maher, Chief Technology Officer of Infinira, stated: This achievement emphasizes the value of Infinira’s fully vertically integrated and highly programmable ICE-X pluggable product line. It also emphasizes the value of integrated system-level intelligence, which can achieve industry-leading peer-to-peer performance even when deployed in third-party components. ICE-X enables network operators to leverage cost-effective and energy-efficient pluggable solutions in various applications without sacrificing performance, manageability, or network resilience resolution.
Optical Fiber and Cable Supplier Dynamics
OFS Announced that It Has Joined Terabit BiDi MSA
OFS a leading designer, manufacturer, and supplier of innovative fiber optic networking pion. Recently, the MSA published version 1.0 of the optical specification for 800Gb/s and 1.6Tb/s optical interfaces based on 70 meters of OM4 multimode fiber (MMF) and over 100 metersroducts, announced that it had joined the Terabit BiDi MSA (Multiple Source Agreement) organize of OMS multimode fiber. The specification of the MSA utilizes the widely adopted dual-wavelength bidirectional transmission technology. This provides an upgrade path for massively deployed parallel MMF cabling infrastructure. The specification is based on the 100Gb/s Ethernet MMF specification. OFS said that through cooperation with Terabit BiDi MSA organization partners, the company demonstrated 800G BiDi performance over 100 meters of OFS multimode fiber at Broadcom booth 6425 at OFC 2023. Members of the Terabit BiDi MSA include Alibaba, AristaNetworks, Broadcom, Cisco, Coherent, CommScope, Corning Incorporated, Dell Technologies, Huagong Zhengyuan, Hisense Broadband, Lumentum, MACOM, Marvell, OFS, Panduit, and Tencent. “The transition to 100Gb/s signaling per lane is rapidly underway, and the release of the Terabit BiDi specification comes at an opportune time to allow the industry to adopt cost-effective, fast interfaces based on VCSEL solutions,” said MSA Co-Chairman Tzu Hao Chow. “As technology moves from 10Gb/s per lane to 25Gb/s to 50Gb/s, multimode bidirectional optical modules are critical to maintaining the usefulness of existing fiber optic cables in data centers,” said MSA co-chairman David Piehler. The Terabit BiDi specification is the roadmap to continue this trend. “The Terabit BiDi MSA specification addresses short-reach applications, including critical high-capacity interconnects between modern data center switches. Terabit BiDi MSA participants are responding to industry demand for low-cost and low-power 800Gb/s and 1.6Tb/s package formats.” The needs of power consumption solutions and bi-directional MMF technology can meet these needs.
OFC 2023: OFS to Develop Multicore Fiber (MCF) for Its Submarine Fiber Portfolio
OFS, a leading designer, manufacturer, and supplier of innovative fiber optic networking products, has announced the development of multicore optical fibers for its marine product portfolio. TeraWave SCUBA 4X multicore marine fiber uses four-core space-division multiplexing (SDM) technology to provide four times the optimal bandwidth in marine applications. As subsea communication networks continue to evolve to support net data rates of 1Pb per second (1 Petabit/s) and beyond, it is clear that wet equipment hardware requires revolutionary rather than evolutionary changes. SCUBA 4X multicore fiber will be the basis of a new generation of transmission technology, aiming to break through the bandwidth limitation of single-core fiber. SCUBA 4X has excellent transmission performance in C and L bands, with an attenuation of less than 0.165dB/km at 1550nm and an industry-leading adjacent core crosstalk of -70dB/km at 1550nm. Other properties will be consistent with G.654 B/C compliant submarine fiber (9.7mm mode field at 1550nm, cut-off wavelength below 1520nm, standard cladding and coating dimensions). David DiGiovanni, Chief Technology Officer of OFS and President of OFS Labs, said: “OFS and FEC are committed to being the industry leader in SDM-based communications technology with a comprehensive product portfolio including fiber optics, connectivity, and converged splicing. We are working with several key customers who are adopting breakthrough increases in bandwidth density.”
MACOM Announces $49 Million Acquisition of Linearizer
Acquirer: MACOM.
Acquiree: Linearizer, founded by Dr. Allen Katz in 1991, focuses on nonlinear microwave pre-distortion for ground, avionics, and space-based applications, as well as high-performance microwave photonic solutions for industrial and defense markets. The Linearizer team uses proprietary design and manufacturing techniques to produce high-performance components and subsystems.
Transaction amount: $49 million
“We are pleased to welcome the Linearizer team to MACOM,” said Stephen G. Daly, MACOM President and CEO. “This acquisition strengthens MACOM’s component and subsystem design expertise in target markets, which aligns with our long-term growth strategy.”
Dr. Allen Katz, Founder and President of Linearizer, said: “We are excited to be a part of MACOM. The synergy between our two organizations is incredible. We look forward to leveraging the resources that MACOM can bring to our growth strategy.”
The purchase price is approximately $49 million, funded with cash. MACOM plans to retain and expand Linearizer’s current manufacturing and engineering facilities. The acquisition is expected to be immediately accretive to MACOM’s adjusted EPS. However, due to the timing of the acquisition’s completion, the investment will not likely have a material impact on MACOM’s revenue and adjusted EPS in the second quarter of fiscal 2023.
Other Acquisitions and Mergers Dynamics
Airspan Sells Mimosa FWA business to Jio for $60m
Radisys, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Airspan and Jio, announced the sale of Mimosa to Radisys for a debt-free, cash-free consideration of USD 60 million. Airspan acquired Mimosa in 2018 to enable cost-effective fixed wireless access network connectivity. Mimosa has a portfolio of point-to-point and point-to-multipoint products based on WiFi 5, the newer WiFi 6E technology, and related accessories such as twisted antennas, PoE injectors, etc. These solutions have use cases in the backhaul requirements of 5G and FTTX/FWA deployments. Jio has been a major customer of Mimosa. Following the acquisition by Radisys, Mimosa’s 56-employee product development, manufacturing, and sales teams will remain with Mimosa. Airspan maintains a reseller channel for specific joint 4G/5G and FWA projects and will continue to sell Mimosa products to select customers post-acquisition. Jio President Mathew Oommen commented on the deal: “Over the years, our partnership with Airspan has resulted in a pioneering architecture for high-speed connectivity for end-users and backhaul applications. The acquisition of Mimosa will further accelerate Jio’s innovation and leadership in producing telecom network products that deliver value to consumers and businesses globally through cost-effective, rapidly deployable fixed and mobile broadband.”
Ziply Fiber Announces Acquisition of Ptera
Ziply Fiber announced the acquisition of Ptera, a fiber optic internet and fixed wireless internet provider serving four counties in eastern Washington and northern Idaho. This is Ziply’s fourth acquisition since June 2022 and is scheduled to close later this year, pending regulatory approval. Founded in 2001 and headquartered in Liberty Lake, Washington, Ptera serves over 4,000 clients in cities including Airway Heights, Cheney, Liberty Lake, Medical Lake, Otis Orchards, and more. All Ptera employees will join the Ziply Fiber team as part of the acquisition. There will not be any immediate changes to service or working relationships with current Ptera customers. Once the acquisition is formalized (which could take several months), customers will benefit from expanded customer service capabilities and access to new offerings such as SD-WAN and improved network management capabilities.
T-Mobile to Acquire Mint Mobile and Ultra Mobile
T-Mobile US announced that it has entered into a definitive agreement to acquire Ka’ena Corporation and its subsidiaries and brands: Mint Mobile, a successful direct-to-consumer (D2C) prepaid wireless brand in the US; Ultra Mobile, a unique wireless service, Provides international calling options to communities across the country; Wholesaler Plum. Through this agreement, these brands will continue to have exclusive access to Un-carrier’s most significant, fastest, and most reliable 5G network. T-Mobile is acquiring these brands’ sales, marketing, digital, and services businesses. It plans to use its supplier relationships and distribution scale to help these brands grow and provide a competitive offering to more U.S. consumers looking for great value. Prices and more equipment in stock. The Un-carrier will also leverage Mint’s industry-leading digital D2C marketing expertise as part of its more comprehensive portfolio to reach new customer segments and geographies. The Mint and Ultra brands complement the company’s current prepaid service offerings Metro (T-Mobile), T-Mobile branded prepaid, and Connect (T-Mobile).
New Products and New Technologies for Equipment Manufacturers
VIAVI Releases New High-Speed Ethernet Test Platform at OFC 2023
VIAVI Solution will highlight new Ethernet test solutions at OFC 2023, March 7-9, in San Diego, USA. Ethernet is driving bandwidth and scale at unprecedented speeds. Ethernet technology also possesses the key characteristics of classic DWDM in fields such as data center interconnection (DCI) and ultra-long distance (such as ZR). Higher levels of testing are also required to meet Ethernet scale and bandwidth, as well as service provisioning and DWDM capabilities. More than ever, network architects and developers need sophisticated instrumentation to test higher-speed Ethernet services for greater flexibility and performance. VIAVI has expanded its presence in Ethernet testing with a new High-Speed Ethernet (HSE) platform. This multiport solution complements the industry-leading physical layer test capabilities of the VIAVI ONT-800 platform. HSE provides integrated circuit, module, and network system companies with high-speed equipment for testing up to 128 x 800G. It provides physical layer testing capabilities with advanced traffic generation and analysis to troubleshoot and test the functionality and performance of integrated circuits, pluggable interfaces, and switching and routing devices and networks. VIAVI will also demonstrate the recently announced 800G Ethernet Technology Consortium (ETC) capabilities of the ONT 800G FLEX XPM module, which supports the testing needs of hyper-scale enterprises, data centers, and related applications. In addition to supporting the implementation of 800G ETC, it also provides a wide range of forward error correction (FEC) stress and verification tools, which are critical for implementing ASIC, FPGA, and IP. VIAVIONT 800G XPM also provides tools to verify possible future IEEE 802.3df drafts.
Nokia Launches Beacon 10, A Wi-Fi 6E Gateway for Gigabit Networks
Nokia launched the Beacon 10, its first Wi-Fi 6E-enabled gateway that delivers seamless, high– capacity mesh networking. The Beacon 10 is an accurate tri-band device that can deliver 10Gbps of Wi-Fi throughput. It includes a 10G WAN interface paired with a 10GB/S fiber modem to provide multi-gigabit services to the home. The widespread rollout of 10G fiber powered by XGS-PON will require an upgrade to home and business Wi-Fi to deliver ultra-high speeds to enabled devices. The “E” in Wi-Fi 6E means faster speeds and lower latency, ideal for the latest office applications, home entertainment, and homework experiences. In addition, Nokia also announced at the show that it had upgraded the Nokia WiFi Cloud Controller as a User Service Platform (USP) controller. USP is an industry-standard protocol (also known as TR-369) for managing services and configurations in network devices (remotely via cloud applications or locally via mobile applications). Nokia’s USP proxy in Beacon 10 is based on the open-source OB-USPA, so any USP controller, including Nokia WiFi Cloud Controller, can manage it. Nokia’s presentation at MWC also highlighted its newly developed Wi-Fi management and optimization all-in-one. The console will be available to customer service operators, network administrators, field technicians, and Level 3 support staff to provide advanced WiFi optimization, troubleshooting, and management.
Ethernity Networks Launches New Combo PON OLT
Ethernity Networks launched its latest product UEP3808 Combo PON OLT. UEP3808 can be used as a complete OLT with software or as a white box product, allowing OEMs to port their software to the platform. UEP3808 can integrate two or four FPGAs in one OLT, equipped with Eternity’s PON OLT controller semiconductor IP, to achieve various flexible port configurations. The device can provide up to 16 XGS-PON ports, 8 CPON ports, 16 GPON ports, or a combination thereof, 2 100GbE ports, and 6 10/25GbE ports to provide a switching capacity of 800Gbps. Furthermore, all configurations use the same hardware design, and to support various configurations, pin-compatible FPGAs can be assembled on the same hardware. Like all Ethernity products, the UEP3808 also offers hardware acceleration of the data plane with advanced traffic management and high-quality service, creating a lower-cost option than commodity silicon-based products. The unique design of the UEP3808 is also suitable for a completely different use case, in this case, it can act as an aggregator and bonding/unbinding unit for up to eight UEP2025 devices by porting Ethernity’s bonded semiconductor technology to FPGAs, covering environments spanning multiple radio towers.
ZTE Releases 50G PON&10G GPON&GPON Three-mode Combo PON Product Solution
ZTE released 50G PON&10G GPON&GPON three-mode Combo PON product solution. This solution adopts an independent wavelength superposition mechanism, which can realize the sharing of ODN and platform of GPON, 10G GPON, and 50G PON technologies at the same time and solve the problems of high construction cost, large equipment room space, and Problems such as complex fiber optic cabling and complicated operation and maintenance help operators quickly and flexibly deliver high-bandwidth services, simplify network construction and save deployment costs. This solution inherits and develops the concept of Combo PON and is another innovation for the smooth evolution of the PON network to 50GPON. ZTE actively invests in and continues to promote the standardization and industrialization of 50G PON to promote the development and maturity of the next-generation optical access network. The three-mode Combo PON product solution of 50G PON&10G GPON&GPON released this time fully meets the three-generation PON system coexistence solution proposed by China Telecom based on three-mode MPM optical modules. During the network upgrade process, there is no need to adjust the ODN network. It is unnecessary to change the existing equipment configuration and user service data of the OLT, helping operators deploy on demand and smooth network evolution flexibly. At the same time, one optical module integrates functions such as 50G PON, 10G GPON, GPON, and multiplexer. It does not need to add additional equipment, does not occupy additional room space, greatly saves the types of line cards, and simplifies maintenance and management.
Infinera Launches a High-performance Coherent Photonic System and Coherent Pluggable Optical Engine
Infinera has released a new portfolio of coherent photonic systems and coherent pluggable optical engines designed to help network operators cost-effectively keep up with rising bandwidth demands while simplifying operations and reducing their carbon footprint. The new solution includes a series of high-performance transceiver optical assemblies (TROSA), an innovative programmable digital signal processor (DSP), and a series of high-performance smart pluggable optical transceivers. Infinera’s in-house developed family of optical subsystems utilizes a creative building block approach that allows the flexibility to mix and match subsystems, maximizing the value of each element, providing customers with more solution options, and simplifying communication with internal Integration with third-party light engines. Based on Infinera’s vertically integrated subsystem building blocks, the Infinera ICE-X family of coherent pluggable solutions is designed to support various network applications, including point-to-point and point-to-multipoint in DCI, access, metro, and area networks application. In addition to record-setting performance, Infinera’s ICE-X family of pluggable products enables unique intelligence, automation, and programmability, enabling network operators to more efficiently deploy coherent solutions on routers, switches, and servers, without compromising performance, visibility, or network resiliency. In addition, by supporting 100Gb/s+ single-fiber bidirectional configuration and PON coverage, ICE-X can unleash the potential of existing fiber assets and enable new revenue-generating high-speed services. The ICE-X pluggable module family includes 100G XR, 400G XR, 400G ZR+, and 800G ZR/ZR+ modules.
Infinera Launches Next-generation 1.2T ICE7 Light Engine and Expands Its GX Compact Modular Platform
Infinera released its industry-leading GX series compact modular platform solutions, including a new generation of high-performance 1.2Tb/s optical engine ICE7 and a revolutionary multi-pass optical line system. This latest set of enhancements highlights the power and flexibility of the GX platform, providing network operators with seamless, future-proof end-to-end network solutions. The GX platform and ICE7 optical engine will reduce cost per bit by 30% and power per bit by 60%, enabling network operators to cost-effectively meet rapidly growing bandwidth demands and provide differentiated services to customers. The GX platform supports multi-haul line system functions, multi-generation high-speed transponders, and various traffic grooming bases on a single platform. Combined with local open API and streaming telemetry functions, it is the industry’s most versatile open and compact modular platform. The GX platform provides network operators with a unified end-to-end network solution that can break down barriers between metro, regional, and long-distance and seamlessly support integrated, external, and IPoD WDM optical signals. By simplifying the introduction of new technologies, the GX platform can simplify network operations and reduce operating expenses and capital expenditures. Infinera’s ICE7 optical engine supports the existing GX platform and will be available in the first half of 2024. It has the following advantages: Reduced cost, space, and power per bit — using the industry’s highest performance optical engine, which can reduce the cost per bit by 30% %, a 60% reduction in power/space per bit, and support for symbol rates up to 148Gbaud. Transmit 800G almost everywhere — 800G-based transmission can reach 3,000 kilometers, more than three times the coverage of existing technologies, covering more than 85% of network links. Deployable on Virtually Any Network — It can operate efficiently on virtually any optical line system by supporting a wide range of programmability options and open APIs.
New Products and Technologies for Equipment Manufacturers
Huawei Launches Industry’s First 50G POL Prototype to Build Next-Generation Campus Network for Wi-Fi 7
Huawei Releases Industry’s First 50G POL Prototype to Help Industry Customers Build a New Generation of Campus Networks for Wi-Fi 7 Huawei’s all-optical campus solution based on F5G ( Huawei’s all-optical campus solutions based on F5G (fifth-generation fixed network) are commercially available to more than 6,000 industrial customers worldwide, enabling enterprises to build green and simple smart campuses. Huawei’s all-optical campus solutions based on F5G (fifth-generation fixed network) have been commercially available to over 6,000 industrial customers worldwide, enabling enterprises to build green and simple smart campuses. With the wide application of cloud computing, big data, IoT, and other technologies, campus scenarios such as enterprise office, education, medical 4K/8K, and AR/VR applications are increasing rapidly, placing higher demands on the bandwidth, latency, and reliability of campus networks. Huawei Optical Products Although 10G PON can meet the needs of most campus scenarios, with the deepening digitization of enterprises, the demand for network bandwidth and latency has emerged,” said Jin Zhiguo, vice president of Huawei’s optical product line. As enterprises become more digital, new scenarios with higher network bandwidth and latency requirements emerge, and campus networks will also face upgrades. Huawei released the industry’s first 50G POL prototype Huawei released the industry’s first 50G POL prototype to build a green and ultra-wide campus network for Wi-Fi 7 to support the implementation of innovative applications.”
Huawei Launches Industry’s First All-optical 2000 Megabit FTTR Starlight F30 Product for the World
At the Huawei 2023 ICT Solutions and Products Conference, Jin Yuzhi, president of Huawei’s optical product line, officially launched the industry’s first GPON and XGS-PON Combo network uplink-supported Huawei Starlight F30 series, the industry’s first 2000Mbps FTTR all-optical home networking product that supports GPON and XGS-PON Combo network uplink, realizes the ultimate whole-home super-gigabit-enabled digital home experience. The product’s appearance was designed by experts from Huawei’s French Aesthetic Institute. The new appearance and four colors are designed to integrate into the modern home style perfectly; the form includes desktop, wall-mounted, and panel types to meet a variety of installation scenarios. Any placement does not occupy an area; supports GPON, and It supports GPON and XGS-PON Combo network uplink to achieve smooth network evolution; combined with hardware and innovative algorithms, users can experience a whole house network speed of 2000Mbps; it takes only Equipped with multi-beam dual-polarization antenna, it significantly improves coverage by 30%, and with the patented algorithm of signal source positioning, it realizes that Wi-Fi signal moves with people and covers the whole house without dead corners; the original senseless roaming technology makes The unique Multi-AP cooperative concurrency guarantee technology minimizes Wi-Fi interference and supports up to 128 whole-house smart devices to be used at the same time with guaranteed bandwidth. The 5A one-stop service capability includes Accurate Planning, Agile Installation, All-in Acceptance, Active Assurance, and more.
The 5A one-stop service capability includes Accurate Planning, Agile Installation, All-in Acceptance, Active Assurance, and Attentive Care, helping operators build a “Planning, Construction, Inspection and Maintenance” process.
New Products and Technologies for Device Manufacturers
Lumentum Introduces a Series of Tunable Optical Transceivers to Serve Network Edge Evolution
Lumentum Holdings Inc., a market-leading designer and manufacturer of innovative optical and photonic products, is demonstrating live at OFC 2023 a full-band optical tunable transceiver portfolio, including 10G Optical Transport Network (OTN) SFP+, 25G T-SFP28, and 100G coherent CFP2-DCO BiDi transceiver modules. Lumentum Holdings Inc. demonstrates a full-band optical tunable transceiver portfolio at OFC 2023, including 10G Optical Transport Network (OTN) SFP+, 25G T-SFP28, and 100G coherent CFP2-DCO BiDi transceiver modules. Driven by the evolving needs of 5G deployments and distributed access architectures (DAAs), full-band tunable optical transceivers offer compelling advantages over fixed-wavelength transceivers. Lumentum also introduced the industry’s first 100G CFP2-DCO BiDi and 10G OTN modules to address capacity and distance challenges in DAA deployments. The 100G CFP2-DCO BiDi is a unique product that increases capacity using only one fiber. 10G OTN SFP+ provides a solution transmission distances of up to 100 km, compared to 80 km for other solutions. Increasing span length allows network operators to realize significant cost savings in architectures that require large spans (e.g., rural broadband deployments). Significant cost savings.
SiFotonics Introduces 800G Silicon Optical Solution for Data Center and AI/ML Applications
SiFotonics introduces 800G low-power silicon photonic solutions for data centers, artificial intelligence, and machine learning applications. 800G optical transceiver units use SiFotonics’ self-developed silicon optical integrated transceiver chips with specially developed high-performance analog driver and trans-impedance amplifier ICs to deliver industry-leading high bandwidth, additional gain and equalization, and power consumption exceeding 10. The power consumption exceeds 10 picojoules per bit record, more than 40% lower than conventional solutions. The combination of high capacity, high performance, and low power consumption makes this solution ideal for next-generation data center ultra-bandwidth optical connectivity, artificial intelligence, and machine learning computing applications.
POET Releases POET Infinity, a 400G, 800G, and 1.6T Data Center Solution Based on the Chiplet Launch Platform
POET Technologies, an optical interposer and designer and developer of photonic integrated circuits for the data center, telecom, and artificial intelligence markets, introduces “POET Infinity,” a 400G, 800G, and 1.6T pluggable transceiver and co-packaged optics (CPO) solution based on the chipset launch platform. The POET Infinity chiplet platform integrates a 100G PAM4 direct modulation laser (DML), DML driver, and an integrated optical multiplexer on a single chip, resulting in a complete 400GBASE-FR4 transmitter solution with a miniaturized chip and daisy chain architecture. The miniaturized chip and daisy-chain structure (daisy chain) allows for the parallel placement of multiple chip entities to achieve 800G and 1.6T speeds. Pluggable transceiver customers can achieve 800G with 2xFR4 transmitters in QSFP-DD or OSFP packages with 2 Infinity chipsets to achieve 800G, and 4 Infinity chiplets in a 4xFR4 solution in an OSFP-XD package to achieve 1.6T. The POET Infinity product line enables all passive source alignment and monolithic integrated waveguide, multiplexer/demultiplexer for POET differentiation, which brings customers lower cost, power consumption, and more efficient assembly. In addition, the 400G Tx OE will be offered by the POET joint venture (SPX), a Xiamen-based superlight integrated circuit company, which will be responsible for the production and supply.
Other New Products and Technologies
Corning Introduces New Ultra-low Loss Fiber Vascade EX2500
At OFC 2023, Corning introduced Vascade EX2500 fiber, the latest innovation in its ultra-low loss fiber product line. The Vascade EX2500 fiber has the lowest attenuation coefficient of any Corning marine fiber product (0.148dB/km @1550nm typical) The Vascade EX2500 fiber has the lowest attenuation coefficient of any Corning marine fiber product (typically 0.148 dB/km @ 1550 nm) and a large effective area of 125 μm2. The EX2500 fiber, compliant with ITU-T G.654.B/D/E standards, is designed for the most challenging ultra-long-haul, high-capacity transmission networks. Vascade EX2500 fiber enables marine and terrestrial long-haul backbone networks to improve performance, simplify network design, and build high-value marine and terrestrial long-haul backbone networks. Vascade EX2500 fiber allows marine and terrestrial long-haul trunk networks to improve performance, streamline network design and build high-value marine and terrestrial long-haul networks. Vascade EX2500 fiber is also available in 200μm OD size, the industry’s first 200μm OD fiber to meet the G.654.E standard, which better supports the design and manufacture of high-volume fiber optic cables.
Market Data and Analysis
LC: Optical Communication Application IC Chip Market CAGR of 18% from 2022-2028
LC has updated its PAM4 and Coherent DSP Market report. The market for IC chipsets for optical communications will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18 percent from 2022 to 2028, with total sales increasing from around $2.6 billion in 2022 to nearly $7 billion. Ethernet and DWDM make up the majority of the market. DWDM chipset sales are expected to grow even faster in 2022 due to the first significant shipments of 400ZR/ZR+ transceivers. Sales of 600G and higher-speed DWDM modules (including 800ZR) will grow faster and account for more than 50% of the segment by 2028.
At the time of publication, Ciena, Fujitsu, Infinera, and Nokia announced new DSPs that support coherent DWDM modules at 1.2Tbps or 1.6Tbps per wavelength—summarized in the following table.
Huawei and ZTE demonstrate similar capabilities at Mobile World Congress 2023 (MWC 2023) but have yet to share details of their DSP and optical chip designs publicly.
The first sales of PAM4 DSPs began in 2017-2018, with demand for 400G Ethernet modules from Amazon and 200GbE from Meta in 2021-2022, further driving sales. 800G and 1.6T Ethernet transceiver deployments will drive sales growth of PAM4 DSP chipsets in 2023-2028. Active optical cable (AOC) and active cable (AEC) also require PAM4 DSPs, and demand will continue to grow over the next five years. Demand will continue to grow over the next five years.
DSP-free co-packaged optics (CPO) engines and pluggable optics (called direct drive or linear drive methods) will limit the growth in sales of PAM4 DSPs. Broadcom’s new SerDes for CPO can also drive pluggable optical transceivers without a DSP. While this remains to be proven, it could have a very significant impact on the market. LC’s forecast reflects the gradual adoption of CPO, but the analyst firm has not yet estimated the potential impact of linear drive pluggable transceivers on DSP sales.
Omdia: Broadband Services will Boom with the Addition of 5G
According to a new survey by Omdia, business broadband service providers continue to expand and upgrade their networks. Buyers from small businesses to large enterprises will continue to purchase services.
There are many reasons why broadband adoption is booming worldwide. Contributing factors include the quality of service improvements and changes in how business buyers use network services. As a result, buyers continue to replace legacy private lines with faster/less expensive broadband alternatives. The result is that buyers continue to replace legacy private lines with faster/less costly broadband alternatives. Wireless broadband momentum is also growing 5G is the strongest complement to traditional wireline services.
Omdia assessed the potential of broadband services in 67 markets worldwide and forecasted market changes in the next five years (to 2027). The study’s findings include the following:
Globally, fixed broadband business revenues will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 2.8 percent. Most revenue growth will come from new primary and secondary broadband connections. Fixed ARPU for fixed subscriptions will remain virtually unchanged over the next five years.
The potential for fixed commercial broadband revenue growth in South Asia is particularly strong, spurred by the potential for fixed wireless access. Particularly strong.
Regarding mobile service subscriptions, 5G will reach a global tipping point in 2027. As 5G subscribers approach 500 million, its mobile service broadband market share will exceed 50%. There will be market differences in global enterprise 5G adoption, as many countries remain highly focused on expanding 4G networks. Africa and East/Southeast Asia have the highest potential for broadband revenue growth from mobile services. In terms of 5G， South Asia, Africa, East/Southeast Asia, and Latin America are all strong market candidates for 5G. If operators capitalize on the potential of 5G as an alternative to wireline broadband, they will Gain rapid growth momentum over the next five years.
Yole: CPO Market to Generate $2.6 Billion in Revenue by 2033
Data from the Yole report shows that the CPO market generated revenues of approximately $38 million in 2022 and is expected to reach $2.6 billion in 2033, growing at a CAGR of 46% from 2022-2033. Predictions for the rapidly growing size of training data (Training dataset) suggest that data will be a major bottleneck in scaling ML models so we may see a slowdown in artificial intelligence (AI) progress. Optical input/output (I/O) in ML hardware can help overcome this bottleneck. Out (I/O) in ML hardware can help overcome this bottleneck. This bottleneck is a major driver for adopting optical interconnect for next-generation high-performance computing (HPC) systems. This bottleneck is a major driver for adopting optical interconnects in next-generation high-performance computing (HPC) systems.
With the arrival of 6.4T optical modules by 2029 at the latest, there is likely to be intense competition between CPO and pluggable optics. Several technical hurdles in CPO systems are expected to be resolved now. However, the transceiver industry continues innovating to drive the pluggable optics market. Before CPO systems achieve volume shipments for networking applications, pluggable will use a co-packaging approach. Optical engines will become increasingly popular in high-performance computing and disaggregated future systems. The industry ecosystem, including Ayar Labs, Intel Ranovus, Lightmatter, AMD, GlobalFoundries, and others around machine learning (ML) system providers Nvidia and HPE, has made considerable progress and plans to deliver products in volume between 2024 and 2026 for volume product delivery.
Data from the Yole report shows that the CPO market generated revenues of approximately $38 million in 2022 and is expected to reach $2.6 billion in 2033, growing at a CAGR of 46% from 2022-2033. The rapidly growing training dataset size suggests data will be a major bottleneck in scaling ML models. We may therefore see a slowdown in artificial intelligence (AI) progress. Optical input/output (I/O) in ML hardware can help overcome this bottleneck. Out (I/O) in ML hardware can help overcome this bottleneck. This bottleneck is a major driver for adopting optical interconnect for next-generation high-performance computing (HPC) systems. This bottleneck is a major driver for adopting optical interconnects in next-generation high-performance computing (HPC) systems.
The prospects for CPO in AI/ML systems are different. The potential for billions of optical interconnects (chip-chip and board-board) in the future is driving large foundries to prepare for mass production. Since most photonics manufacturing intellectual property (IP) is held by non-wafer foundries, large foundries such as Tower Semiconductor/Intel GlobalFoundries, ASE Group, TSMC, and Samsung are preparing silicon photonics process flows to accept any photonic integrated circuit (PIC) architecture from design houses. These companies have joined related industry consortia, such as PCIe, CXL, and UCIe. Common specifications for chipset interconnects allow the construction of large System-on-Chip (SoC) packages that exceed the maximum scale-chip size. This allows components from different suppliers to be mixed in the same package and improves manufacturing yields using smaller dies. Each chipset can use a different silicon manufacturing process for a specific device type or computing performance/power requirements.
COVID-19 Fallout: U.S. Fiber Service Providers Slow Deployments
Financial analysts at Evercore say U.S. fiber operators are sharply scaling back their network-building efforts. The analyst warns that the pace of U.S. residential fiber construction activity in 2023 “will remain in line with 2022 levels and may even be slightly slower.” It’s a dramatic turnaround from a few years ago, when analysts hailed “historic” fiber buildout plans by U.S. carriers such as AT&T, Windstream, and Frontier Communications. Throughout 2022, these operators have mostly delivered on their promises. Together, U.S. fiber service providers will connect more than 7.9 million U.S. homes in 2022, according to a survey backed by the Fiber Broadband Association, which the group called “the highest annual deployment ever.”
In early 2023, many of the same suppliers have already lowered their buildout targets for this year. AT&T cut its 2023 expansion target by about 1.3 million locations, according to Evercore analysts; Frontier cut its target by about 300,000 locations; fiber operator) lowered its 2023 target by 482,000 locations. (However, Brightspeed said in a statement that its goals have not changed)
Evercore analysts had predicted that U.S. fiber service providers planned to build 9.4 million new locations in 2023, but now they expect that number to be around 6.5 million.
“We estimate that U.S. fiber providers (excluding cable operators) will add about 6.5 million fiber-optic footprints in 2022, compared to about 4.5 million in 2021, with most of the growth coming from AT&T,” Evercore analysts wrote. However, the pace in 2023 is more uncertain…Overall, we expect deployments (in 2023) to be roughly in line with last year, with roughly 6.5 million additional households in coverage.”
Analysts warn: “We believe that it is not just a matter of time before fiber buildouts are slower than expected, but that the total number of fiber upgrades and overbuilds will likely decline over the next few years. We have heard from several suppliers that, to some extent, they are not seeing the ROI they expected, especially from recent deployments, making them increasingly cautious about future construction plans. Rising equipment and labor prices and increased construction complexity have increased the cost per building. The cost of housing. This, combined with increasing competition from upgrades from fixed wireless and cable operators, reduces the expected return on incremental construction, especially in an environment of high debt capital costs.”
LC: Ethernet Transceiver Market Will Decline 10% in 2023
LightCounting said. Market volatility is nothing new or surprising for Ethernet transceiver suppliers, but seeing forecast declines is always stressful. On the bright side, ignoring warning signs for as long as possible must be part of human nature. We rarely predict big market declines, but we must be realistic about what to expect in 2023. We have revised our 2023 Ethernet transceiver market forecast to a 10% decline from the 2% growth predicted in our October 2022 Market Forecast report. Furthermore, we do not expect the market to experience double-digit growth again until 2025. The long-term compound annual growth rate (CAGR) remains at 13%, as shown.
High market concentration—that is, having a small number of large customers who are prone to change plans—is one reason why markets are prone to volatility. This year Meta shouldered most of the blame. Back in October 2022, we started lowering our forecast for Meta transceiver shipments, and now we’re making another big cut.
During the COVID-19 period, Meta restricted the construction of data centers and the deployment of optical equipment, resulting in lower consumption of transceivers in 2020-2021. Last year’s surge in Meta demand was partly a catch-up from the previous two years, but also the first step in an ambitious data center upgrade plan to support the Metaverse. Meta’s original forecast for 2023 was to double optical deployments. Last year, the company had more than 40 data centers under construction and upgrades.
Now, many of those plans are on hold or scaled back. The company has publicly acknowledged a major shift in its strategy and plans to invest more carefully in the future. However, Meta’s business growth depends on the development of new applications. For Meta, which has more than 2 billion users, the existing business does not have much room for expansion. Regulation of American companies abroad and antitrust legislation at home make innovation a top priority.
Meta promises to build AI infrastructure and catch up to Amazon and Google. This is where most of its 400G transceivers are now used, with 800G transceivers coming next. We have lowered Meta’s demand forecast for 400/800G, but not as much as 200G, which is used in compute nodes.
To support up to 40% annual bandwidth growth in data centers operated by Google, Amazon, and Microsoft, we have not changed our forecast for 1.6T transceiver shipments.
LC: Mixed Results Can’t Hide Clear Signs of An Industry-wide Slowdown
LightCounting has published a market update report for the first quarter of 2023. Ciena, Infinera, Nokia, and several other optical networking equipment suppliers reported strong sales growth in the fourth quarter and expect a solid performance in the first quarter of 2023. However, fourth-quarter results for optical module suppliers were flat or down following strong growth in the second and third quarters, as shown in the chart. Is this the first sign of volatility or a slowdown? Unfortunately, the answer is the latter. Telecom service providers and cloud computing companies are cutting back. Demand for lasers and IC chips fell sharply in the third quarter. The optical transceiver market declined after a quarter. Equipment suppliers’ upbeat financials come from a record order backlog that has accumulated over the past two years amid supply chain shortages. But these backlogs won’t last long, maybe 2-3 quarters at most.
Demand for FTTx optics exceeded expectations in 2022, and the segment is expected to remain stable this year. Governments worldwide are investing in wired broadband, an essential element of the future digital economy.
AI infrastructure investment is also expected to remain strong, given the industry’s enthusiasm for Chat GPT. The problem is that AI systems rely heavily on copper wires, which are still being improved, so the adoption of optics has taken longer than expected.
Finally, China is embarking on a massive new national data center infrastructure. That will help local suppliers, including Huawei and ZTE, which report lower sales in 2022. The appointment of new government officials across the country should be completed by the end of March, and many new projects are expected to start after that.
Dell’Oro Market Report
Dell’Oro: Global PON Equipment Revenue Will Grow 25% in 2022
According to a recent report released by Dell’Oro Group, the total revenue of the global broadband access equipment market will grow to US$19 billion in 2022, an annual growth rate of 17%. Spending on PON equipment continued to drive the overall market, with OLT and ONT revenues reaching $11.7 billion. Jeff Heynen, vice president of Dell’Oro Group, said: “Upgrading and expanding broadband access networks is a clear goal of global operators in 2022. 2023 will remain a key area of investment.” Other highlights from the Q4 2022 Broadband Access and Home Networking Quarterly Report: Full-year total XGS-PON OLT port shipments exceed 2 million units, and total global shipments Reached 2.3 million units. Revenues from remote PHY equipment, remote OLT, and virtual CMTS platforms have grown significantly as cable operators expand their DAA and fiber deployment plans. Total cable access concentrator revenue increased by 1% year-over-year to $1.0 billion.
Dell’Oro: Strong Growth in the SP Router Market in North America and CALA in 2022
According to a recent report released by Dell’Oro Group, in 2022, the global service provider (Service Provider, SP) router and switch market will exceed 14 billion US dollars. North America led the world with double-digit growth, with acceleration in the Caribbean and Latin America (CALA) region offsetting market declines in Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA), and Asia Pacific (APAC). The sharp decline in the Chinese market led to a double-digit decline in revenue in the Asia-Pacific region. Additional Highlights from Dell’Oro Group Q4 2022 Service Provider Routers and Switches Report: Cisco is the number one vendor in the global SP routers and switches market in 2022, followed by Huawei, Nokia, Juniper, and ZTE. Juniper, Ciena, and Cisco will gain the largest market share in 2022. Juniper’s success is due to the company’s new MX product line and ASIC, “Trio-6”. The main contributors are the MX 10000 series chassis and the new small MX304 router, with customer adoption accelerating in the second half of 2022. The expansion of its SP router drove Ciena’s double-digit revenue growth and switch portfolio (such as the 8100 Series Coherent Aggregation Routers) and AT&T’s strong adoption of the company’s Vyatta software in its Disaggregated routing project. Cisco performed strongly in SP core routers, especially in the North American market. The main driver of the company’s share increase is the 8000 series routers. Dell’Oro sees this as a successful product transition for Cisco.
Dell’Oro: North American Optical Transmission Market to Grow 14% in 2022
According to Dell’Oro data, North American optical transmission equipment revenue will increase by 14% in 2022 to exceed US$4 billion. Among the large optical transmission equipment suppliers, the revenue growth of Fujitsu and Infinera far exceeded the market average growth rate. “Demand for optical systems in the North American market continues to be strong, even exceeding the upper end of my expectations,” said Jimmy Yu, vice president of Dell’Oro Group. More system shipments. We think this could signal that component shortages are starting to ease.” Other highlights from the 4Q22 Optical Transport quarterly report: Currency rates remain a concern throughout 2022, which dragged down market performance in many regions. On a constant exchange rate basis, the global optical transport market grew approximately 4% annually, with the WDM segment growing about 5%. The largest vendors in North America are Ciena, Cisco, Fujitsu, and Infinera. Among these suppliers, Fujitsu and Infinera performed significantly better than the others. Fujitsu’s optical equipment revenue rose 80% year-over-year, and Infinera’s grew 38% year-over-year. Internet content provider spending on WDM equipment rebounded in the fourth quarter after an unexpected decline in the third quarter, driving strong growth in the North American market in the fourth quarter.
Dell’Oro: Data Center Switch Sales to Break Records in 2022
According to a recent report from Dell’Oro, global data center switch sales increased by 15% in the fourth quarter of 2022, marking the fifth consecutive quarter of strong double-digit growth for the market. This stunning performance brought sales to new record levels for the quarter and full year of 2022. Revenues rose in all regions except China, which fell nearly 20%. It is worth noting that the only recorded decline in the China region was in the first quarter of 2020, and the new crown pneumonia caused it, and the decline was also small at that time, and it recovered quickly afterward. Other highlights from the Q4 2022 data center switch report: Arista was the primary beneficiary of the quarter’s revenue growth, accounting for most of the growth, followed by Juniper and the white box vendors. Arista’s revenue share rose nearly 7 percentage points in the quarter, and the company’s full-year market share surpassed 20%. Shipments of 200Gbps and 400Gbps in 2022 are close to 10 million ports, accounting for more than 10% of total shipments and nearly 20% of total revenue. The main drivers of growth are these adoption speeds by large cloud service providers such as Google, Amazon, Microsoft, and Meta, as well as improvements in supply.
Dell’Oro: Global Ethernet Adapter Market to Grow 40% in 2022
According to a recent forecast report released by Dell’Oro, the global Ethernet adapter market will grow by 40% in 2022. However, Dell’Oro expects a slowdown in the market in 2023 as server providers reduce inventory levels in anticipation of slumping demand in the enterprise market and major cloud service providers go through a capex digestion cycle. “In 2022, the Ethernet adapter market will see record revenue growth as the product mix shifts to faster ports and higher prices,” said Baron Fung, Research Director, Dell’Oro Group. “However, the market is changing rapidly — supply Constraints have turned into oversupply, so suppliers are reducing inventory levels. Demand in the enterprise segment is expected to slow this year, and some major cloud service providers are expected to experience a server digestion cycle. However, as server access speeds increase, There are also opportunities in some market segments. We expect wider adoption of Smart NICs in 2023.” Other highlights of the Q4 2022 Ethernet Adapters and Smart NICs report include the following: Ethernet adapter market revenue will grow by 13%. Ports with speeds of 100Gbps and above could account for nearly half of the market by 2023. In 2023, open suppliers of smart NICs such as AMD, Intel, and NVIDIA will see opportunities in the cloud and enterprise markets.
Dell’Oro: Global Data Center Capex to Grow 15% to $241 Billion in 2022
According to a recent report released by Dell’Oro Group, global data center capital spending will increase by 15% in 2022 to reach $241 billion. However, the research firm expects cloud and enterprise data center spending growth to decelerate to single digits in 2023. “Hyperscale cloud service providers have experienced a strong expansion cycle for three years while continuing to navigate a supply-constrained environment,” said Baron Fung, senior research director Dell’Oro Group. Spending. However, there will be a correction in the market as hyper-scale cloud service providers are at the tail end of their expansion cycle and seek to improve efficiency; at the same time, enterprises will scrutinize spending more carefully in an uncertain economic environment. Therefore, some Demand in some industries will soften, and a supply-constrained environment will turn into an environment of excess supply.” Other highlights from the Q4 2022 Data Center IT Capital Spending Quarterly Report: In 2022, the world’s top 10 cloud service providers accounted for 48% of global data center capex. In terms of revenue, the leading server vendor in 2022 is Dell, followed by HP and Inspur. Upcoming changes in server architecture and accelerated computing will help the long-term outlook for data center investments.
Summarize
In 2022, the revenue of the three major operators will all achieve positive growth. In terms of 5G users, the three major operators added 25.815 million new 5G package users in February, an increase of 9.248 million compared with the previous month. The cumulative number of 5G package users totaled approximately 1.137 billion.
In the first quarter of the fiscal year 2023, Ciena’s revenue was US$1.057 billion, a year-on-year increase of 25.1%. The Open XR Forum announced that Hisense Broadband, KDDI, Lumentum, and Viettel had joined an industry initiative to advance the deployment of software-configurable point-to-point and point-to-multipoint coherent optical networks utilizing industry-defining XR optical pluggable transceiver technology.
At OFC 2023, many companies showcased their latest products. For example, Infinera launched the next-generation 1.2T ICE7 optical engine and expanded its GX compact modular platform, Accelink launched 100G QSFP28 ZR4 BIDI, Huagong Zhengyuan released the Demo 400G ZR+ Pro coherent optical module globally, and Corning launched a new ultra-low loss optical fiber Vascade EX2500, etc.
LC has updated the PAM4 and coherent DSP market report. The IC chipset market for optical communications will grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18% from 2022 to 2028, with total sales growing from around $2.6 billion in 2022 to nearly $7 billion. According to Dell’Oro data, in 2022, the total revenue of the global broadband access equipment market will increase to US$19 billion, an annual growth rate of 17%. Spending on PON equipment continued to drive the overall market, with OLT and ONT revenues reaching $11.7 billion.