Transparent Ethernet

Bypassing of routers and switches saves major costs in optical networks because typically as much as 70% of the traffic is transit traffic bypassing the router in e.g. a ring configuration. Traditionally, bypassing is achieved in optical networks using optical add/drop network elements allowing bypass of one or more wavelengths.

TransPackets transparent Ethernet (Virtual Wavelengths) enables transparent transport with wavelength-grade QoS of Ethernet-framed traffic. As for real wavelengths, transport with a minimum of latency, zero packet jitter and no packet loss is enabled. A virtual wavelength path can be defined for bypassing intermediate switches/routers, similar to conventional wavelengths. There is however two significant differences from real wavelengths. Unused bandwidth may at all times be employed by intermediate nodes along the virtual wavelength path. Secondly, the granularity of a virtual wavelength is dynamic, allowing statistical multiplexing and full capacity utilization.