By exploiting the “Amitié” submarine cable linking Bordeaux to Boston, Cisco and Microsoft managed to set a transmission record of 800 Gbit/s. Enough to open a new era of connectivity.
Cisco has undoubtedly left its mark on the history of telecommunications. In partnership with Microsoft, the American IT company managed to reach the crazy speed of 800 Gbit/s in transmission, on the Amitié transatlantic cable, 6,234 kilometers long between Bordeaux and more precisely the commune of Porge, in New Aquitaine , and Boston, Massachusetts. Cisco sees this achievement as a major argument to respond to the explosion of cloud and artificial intelligence services around the world.
A high-tech submarine cable that connects the United States to France
We probably don’t talk about it enough, but submarine cables are fundamental to connectivity and the exchange of global data: 90% of international traffic passes through them. The one that connects France to the United States, called Amitié, integrates SDM technology (Space Division Multiplexing) which includes 16 pairs of fibers, which remember is superior to traditional cables and even the famous Dunant cable from Google and its 12 pairs of fibers. We will add that Orange is responsible for the French part of the two cables.
Concerning Amitié, the power of the repeater is distributed between the 16 pairs of fibers, which guarantees greater capacity. This innovation also represents a real step forward in the strengthening of underwater networks, to meet the growing needs of the digital world. Partly operated by Cisco, Amitié connects the United States, the United Kingdom and France and is an integral part of Microsoft’s global network.
Significant potential for improving the network
For those in the know, the trial was successfully completed using the Cisco NCS 1014 platform enabled by Acacia’s Coherent Interconnect Module 8 (CIM 8), which is powered by its Jannu digital signal processors and advanced silicon photonics. The products are also available and deployable on several networks.
800 Gbit/s per second, that’s mind-blowing in 2 stats 🚀
Imagine that 800 Gbps transmission corresponds to 8 million simultaneous Webex audio calls and requires only 2 seconds to download Call of Duty.
For Cisco, this success at 800 Gbit/s demonstrates the potential to improve overall network capacity at a time of ever-increasing demand. Jamie Gaudette, general manager of cloud networking engineering at Microsoft, explains that this field trial “ demonstrates that commercial technology for submarine cables exists, and we can improve network capacity and contribute to the digital transformation of people, organizations and industries around the world “.
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