Nokia Subsea

Seamlessly integrate with terrestrial networks

Subsea line terminating equipment (SLTE) historically used WDM technology to maximize fiber utilization and also to perform wavelength translation at the landing station for hand-off to a terrestrial network. While effective, this approach meant use of costly optical transponders to in an optical-electrical-optical arrangement, using fiber patch cables to manually connect desired wavelength transponders to their target destinations. This solution is both costly and cumbersome, requiring advance planning, significant physical equipment space and manual cable connection during upgrades or failures.  

Advances in optical technology, including tunable lasers, wavelength selectable switches and other components have allowed construction of a highly flexible, reconfigurable optical add-drop (ROADM) SLTE. These systems give the operator a solution that offers the flexibility to manage wavelengths between the terrestrial network and wet plant while also reducing initial equipment and sparing cost. Physical location of the ROADM SLTE can be located at the landing station or at a convenient in-land location such as the terrestrial POP. This also offers the flexibility to maximize network capacity, if desired, through cable landing regeneration.  

Nokia subsea solutions are highly flexible, including modular, chassis-based and data center design form-factors, powered by AC or DC. 

Operate Multiple SLTE on a single fiber

Subsea cable operators need to seek ways to amortize costs among multiple customers. Sharing cable infrastructure, especially line terminating equipment, can be problematic for some end customers with concerns about security, control and scalability. In other cases, cooperative arrangements encourage continued use of legacy SLTE with an adjunct capability for easy capacity upgrade. 

These scenarios are easily accommodated through an open, modular-design system, capable of supporting multiple SLTE on a single fiber pair. Nokia’s 1830 PSS optical transport portfolio provides this modularity through highly flexible, chassis-based and data center design form-factors. 

Restore services across multi-operator lines

Laid over the seabed and buried near-shore, subsea cables are vulnerable to damage from geological events such as earthquakes and undersea landslides as well as coastal human accidents. Yet cable networks are also hugely complex and expensive to construct and maintain, limiting an operator’s ability to construct multiple cables and keep pace with rapid capacity demand expansion. Repair of a severed cable can take weeks or longer to complete and is very costly. For these reasons, contingency plans must be ready to deploy in the event of cable faults. 

Operators that deploy ROADM-based SLTE at their landing stations or integrate them into the terrestrial network, open the possibility of providing fault protection contingency plans through traffic re-routing over the terrestrial network. Traffic impacted by a fault on one cable can be easily re-routed through spare capacity on another undersea cable, using layer-0 GMPLS control of the optical mesh terrestrial network. Fault contingencies can be pre-defined as an SLA between cable operators and provide mutual protection to each other.

Optimize cable spectrum utilization

On any subsea cable, existing spectrum is rarely completely used by live traffic or for protection reserve. Optimizing cable capacity utilization helps the operator amortize costs through realizing new revenue streams. Using software platforms that virtualize unused spectrum, the cable operator can effectively lease capacity to terrestrial service providers who, in turn, can then sub-lease standardized services such as MEF carrier Ethernet to other service providers or directly to enterprise end-customers.

Nokia WaveSuite software enables you to automate monetization of your subsea cable and optimize its performance. Based on open networking initiatives, WaveSuite applications enable you to easily establish service level agreements with network customers and allow customers to track their service performance with user portals. They provide focused, lightweight tools and success-based economics, all driven by a business optimized user experience.