Juniper Unveils its Converged Supercore

With one of its signature multi-PR blasts this morning, Juniper Networks (NASDAQ:JNPR, news, filings) launched itself into the packet optical arena.  They unveiled their new their Converged Supercore, which aims to put them right in the thick of things with Ciena and Alcatel-Lucent.  The idea is, in their words, to combine ‘the inherent efficiency of MPLS, the simplicity of switching and integrated optics to deliver unmatched network scale with fewer network elements.’  It’s a different approach in a rapidly evolving market.

The announcement includes a converged packet transport switch, the PTX Series, that scales up to an impressive 480Gbps per slot, with expandability up to 2Tbps, lower power consumption, and a total system scale of up to 3800Tbps.  It’ll be a little while before anyone needs quite that much in one box I think.  The switch is powered by a new silicon chipset, the Junos Express, that is tuned for transport applications, with of course the obligatory power efficiency and scalability up to that 2Tbps per slot mentioned earlier.  It is built in 40nm technology with 3.55B transistors, and its development soaked up about $40M.

As visions go, it’s an important step for Juniper.  Just how this all fits alongside the plans of Ciena, Alcatel-Lucent, and others is something to watch.  Frankly, I am still trying to figure out how it might all shake out.

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Categories: Telecom Equipment