The SEA-ME-WE 5 (South East Asia-Middle East-Western Europe 5) cable system, which spans 20,000 km and connects 17 countries, has completed a significant upgrade using Ciena’s GeoMesh Extreme solution.
The upgrade – which was completed ahead of schedule – resulted in an 100% active capacity increase of the cable. SEA-ME-WE 5 was originally designed with 3 fiber pair and a capacity of 24 Terabits per second. In contrast with other submarine cable systems, the SEA-ME-WE 5’s main endpoints are carrier-neutral/open Points-of-Presence (PoPs) and not just Cable Landing Stations (CLS).
Ciena’s GeoMesh Extreme features the 6500 Packet-Optical platform. The deployment leverages Ciena’s WaveLogic Ai platform to help lower the cost per 100Gbps significantly by increasing the capacity per wave up to 300Gbps. In addition, SEA-ME-WE 5 will also leverage Ciena’s Manage, Control and Plan (MCP) domain controller software to get real-time visibility into the performance of the network.
“SEA-ME-WE 5’s latest upgrade is a great reflection of the dynamic digital transformation that’s taking place along the Europe to Asia route, which is experiencing an overwhelming demand for capacity. Ciena’s strength in developing subsea innovations affords us a keen understanding of the right mix of technologies needed to transition to adaptive networks that leverage intelligence, scalability and programmability,” stated Ian Clarke, Vice President of Global Submarine Sales, Ciena.
