Huawei Proposes Optical Slicing as the Cornerstone for Next-Generation Optical Transport Networks

[Shenzhen, China, March 25, 2021] Richard Jin, President of Huawei's Transmission and Access Product Line, delivered a keynote speech themed "Intelligent Connectivity: the Digital Artery of Industry Intelligent Twins" at the Huawei Industrial Digital Transformation Conference. More importantly, this is the first time Huawei has proposed optical slicing as the cornerstone of the next-generation optical transport network. Huawei Liquid OTN-based optical slicing guarantees a deterministic service experience and supports the long-term evolution of industrial transformation, making it ideal for SDH upgrading in power grid and transportation industries.

Richard Jin, President of Transmission & Access Product Line，Huawei

As services diversify in the power grid and transportation industries, digital upgrades demand higher bandwidth, lower latency, and greater reliability from network solutions and innovative technologies. Richard said: "Optical network is the most deterministic communication mode. Industries with high deterministic requirements, such as power grid and transportation, generally use traditional SDH technology with multi-levels mapping and limited speed. Therefore, it cannot meet the differentiated service requirements of digital transformation. In contrast, optical slicing technology based on Liquid OTN, provides intelligent connectivity and is a much better choice."

Today's world is experiencing explosive data growth, but such data is only valuable when it flows. To ensure efficient data transmission, optical transport networks are needed to build stable and reliable ICT infrastructures, of which China has the world's longest and highest capacity ultra-high voltage direct current (UHVDC) system. This system comprises many digital devices that generate massive data every day, which needs to be carried securely to control centers. With optical slicing, the huge bandwidth of optical fibers are divided into different isolated slices and services enjoy exclusive channels. This eliminates interference and network congestion, delivering differentiated and deterministic bandwidth for services.

Huawei has been leading the evolution of optical transport technologies for the last two decades. Liquid OTN is crucial to promoting the commercialization of optical slicing as it inherits physical isolation from SDH and achieves two innovations:

First, it introduces the OSU encapsulation technology to merge 3 layers into 2, and compared with SDH, it cuts device latency by 30%.

Second, it features a converged architecture, combining the SDH and OTN technologies to provide small-granularity slices and ultra-broadband. The size of a slice can be adjusted on demand in real time from 2 Mbit/s to 100 Gbit/s without impacting services.

Currently, Huawei OptiXtrans E6600, which is the industry's first optical transport platform with Liquid OTN optical slicing technology, has been widely used in the energy, transportation, finance, education, and government sectors. Huawei OptiXtrans E6600 will support services bearing on Ethernet ports on the power grid and transportation production networks, which provides a true deterministic experience based on physical isolation. Huawei will continue to innovate Liquid OTN-based optical slicing technologies, and lead intelligent connections into a deterministic era.

From March 24 to 26, Huawei hosts the Industrial Digital Transformation Conference 2021 online, exploring the power of the resilient and innovative digital world from three perspectives: business, technology, and ecosystems. Huawei will share insights on digital transformation, and introduce business strategies, talent programs, and ecosystems that support it. We will detail practices that the business has carried out over recent years in the government, education, transportation, finance, and energy sectors, etc. We will also showcase the latest developments in areas including connectivity, cloud and AI.