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Networks & Infrastructure
C5: “Ethernet Not Carrier Class,” Says Telecom Italia
Scalability, Availability and Manageability Flagged Up As Problem Areas
by Ken Wieland
Telecom Italia is asking vendors of carrier Ethernet kit for much-needed improvements before the technology can be deployed widely in tier one operators’ networks at the transport layer (Layer 2).
“You cannot say that Ethernet is a true carrier class technology,” says Saverio Orlando, head of wireline access and transport network for Italy’s incumbent operator, speaking at the C5 World Forum event in Milan, Italy. “It needs to evolve from simply being an enterprise application.”
This is a view echoed by Matt Beal, program director for BT’s 21CN program (see Goodbye PSTN, Hello 21CN). “It’s fair to say that carrier Ethernet is not ready yet,” he says.
Carrier Ethernet is a hot topic at C5 (short for the tongue-twisting customer-centric converged communication and content) as it holds the promise of lower opex and capex costs compared with legacy transport technologies (such as SDH and ATM) and even Layer 2 MPLS.
But if it can’t yet deliver the functionality that operators require, then adoption will be limited. Orlando highlights particular problems for carrier Ethernet for core network deployment. “There are still scalability, availability, traffic engineering and O&A [operations & management] problems that still need to be overcome,” he says.
Orlando says that with “legacy” fault management systems, the alerts flag up why a service has failed and locate exactly where the problem is within the network to the router and the port. With carrier Ethernet OAM systems, Orlando says they are not sophisticated enough.
Carrier Ethernet’s shortcomings in the core network may be overcome by PBT (packet backbone transport) technology (see PBB-TE Ups Ante on Ethernet Transport). PBT is another huge topic at C5 and one that Telecommunications® will be following closely but the jury is still out on when it will be ripe for commercial deployment.
In the meantime, Telecom Italia is using Ethernet for particular applications in an attempt to take advantage of lower capex and opex costs. Last year, the Italian incumbent began using Ethernet to backhaul UMTS traffic from Node Bs (3G base stations). However, Orlando says there were “difficulties” in making the service work – hinting that the kit was not up to scratch – but service deployment was surely not helped by the fact that the current crop of Node Bs only have ATM interfaces (Telecom Italia uses MPLS pseudowires to map ATM over Ethernet for its UMTS backhaul application). Node Bs with Ethernet interfaces are not expected to become available until next year.
Telecom Italia is also exploring the use of Ethernet to backhaul traffic from remote DSLAMs. The Italian incumbent is under orders from the national regulator to reduce the digital divide. Telecom Italia says it will provide 98.5 per cent territorial coverage with ADSL access by 2009. “We need to find ways of reducing our costs in places where it is not economical to roll out fiber,” says Orlando
Although Telecom Italia and BT have yet to be convinced that carrier Ethernet is ripe for widespread deployment, vendors are still predictably upbeat about its prospects, particularly for deployment in the metro area of the network where they argue that the business case – and carrier class functionality – has been proven.
“If you compare a hybrid Ethernet and Layer 2 MPLS deployment in the metro network to pure Layer 2 MPLS, the ROI for the former is 14 months compared to 20 months with the latter,” says Eyal Rosen, vice president of marketing at Nokia Siemens Networks. “That’s simply because MPLS ports are far more expensive than Ethernet ports.”
Metro Ethernet enthusiasts don’t advocate moving away entirely from Layer 2 MPLS, since that can provide point-to-point connections, which are seen as necessary for service reliability. However, strategic deployment of carrier Ethernet within the metro network – say the vendors – can drastically reduce costs.
More Information:
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