In detail: Following the Packet Optical Transport Systems (P-OTS) evolution

As service providers look to transition to an all-packet based network, the Packet Optical Transport System (P-OTS) has emerged as the mechanism that can support packet transport services such as Ethernet and MPLS over optical networks.

From a vendor perspective, the field has attracted a number of traditional legacy vendors such as ADTRAN (Nasdaq: ADTN), Alcatel-Lucent (NYSE: ALU), Ciena (Nasdaq: CIEN), ECI, Fujitsu and Tellabs (Nasdaq: TLAB) and emerging companies including BTI, Cyan, and Huawei. A growing number of ILECs, CLECs, wholesalers, and international service providers are leveraging P-OTS as they transition their edge and core networks to IP.

Two of the features that service providers are looking for in a P-OTS platform, as pointed out by Infonetics, are Optical Transport Network (OTN) switching and 40/100G interfaces for the core and, increasingly, the metro network as indicated with Verizon's (NYSE: VZ) recent announcement to put 100G in their metro networks in 2013.

Verizon is coupling its 100G move in the metro by deploying Ciena's 5430 platform to build a logical, global optical network that has all of the benefits of control plane on a global basis for network restoration.

As one of the early movers in the 100G networking space, Ihab Tarazi, vice president of global IP and transport planning and technology for Verizon, believes P-OTS, much like the advent of coherent technologies, have a number of benefits.

"Putting packet into optical is a much more simplified architecture where you can have packet-based services like Ethernet go directly over optical waves," he said. "You don't have to have another layer in the middle."

Besides Verizon, Frontier Communications is leveraging BTI's P-OTS platform and its Integrated Services Delivery Platform, which includes its WideCast caching solution, to cache popular content locally for their subscriber base. It saw two main benefits from this move: reduced network backhaul costs and improving the customer's Quality of Experience (QoE).

Michael Golob, senior vice president, Engineering and Technology for Frontier, said that as the carrier begins using 10G backhaul in some of its markets, BTI's P-OTS platform "is another lever I have to manage costs in the business and also provide a good level of experience for our customers with faster response times."

The chart below lists service providers that are actively upgrading their networks with P-OTS systems.