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CIENA Extends DWDM Product Family

40-Channel DWDM System Delivering 100 Gb/s of Capacity

In a new thrust in dense wavelength division multiplexing (DWDM) technology, Ciena Corporation announced today plans to introduce three additions to its Ciena MultiWaveTM 1600 product line: a 40-channel (100 Gb/s capacity) terminal, an optical add-drop multiplexer (ADM), and a TMN-compliant native Q3 interface for network elements.

"We recently announced a major network deployment of our MultiWaveTM 1600 product line, which we will feature in a live demonstration, next week, at SuperComm 1996," stated Pat Nettles, president and chief executive officer of Ciena. "Our decision to introduce these new additions to the MultiWaveTM family represents the next step towards broadening our product line for high-capacity transport in the photonic layer," Nettles concluded.

"Our advanced technology, including precision optical sources, narrowband optical filtering, and ultra-flat optical amplifiers, enables us to provide 40-channel DWDM systems with extremely narrow channel spacing," said Steve Chaddick, vice president, product development of Ciena.

Ciena's product vision includes transmission systems with many "express" channels, plus optional optical add-drop channels, each operating at rates of up to OC-48. Standard SONET optical interfaces terminate optical spans at each end, reflecting Ciena's "open systems at the photonic layer" approach.

The optical ADM allows one to several OC-48 channels to be dropped and added along a route while remaining channels proceed through in an "express" format. This eliminates the need to terminate the entire optical layer at any intermediate site where access to a fraction of the total payload is needed. Cascadable with the same system performance as a standard optical line amplifier, the MultiWaveTM ADM causes no degradation of the "express" channels.

Consistent with the open systems approach, Ciena also announced the development of a native Q3 TMN interface for network management of Ciena MultiWaveTM products. Part of the WaveWatcher network management family, the Q3 interface reflects the first information model derived from TMN M.3100 and Bellcore GR 1042 for DWDM transmission systems. Both NE layer and Element Management Layer interfaces are supported by WaveWatcher.

Applications for MultiWaveTM products are found in traditional long-haul and interoffice transmission, as well as ATM interconnection and other emerging services.

Ciena's initial product offering, the Ciena MultiWaveTM 1600, is a DWDM system capable of transmitting up to sixteen (16) discrete optical channels over one fiber. Each channel is bit-rate transparent from 150 Mb/s to 2.4 Gb/s and operates with existing SONET/SDH/Asynch fiber optic terminals. This system incorporates optical line amplifier repeaters to extend the transmission range, and it offers integrated network management facilities.

Ciena Corporation develops, manufactures and markets high-capacity fiber optic transmission systems for public networks. These systems unlock fiber bandwidth, improve network reliability and significantly reduce the cost of providing new broadband services. Ciena is providing real-life solutions today to combat the emerging bandwidth and capacity needs long-distance carriers will be faced with tomorrow.