Huawei Launches Its Full Series of 400G WDM Solutions and Commercial Achievements

During MWC 2023, Huawei showcased its full series of 400G WDM solutions to customers. These solutions support various application scenarios such as ultra-high performance, ultra-high integration, and ultra-large capacity, helping operators build transmission networks with the optimal per-bit cost. At MWC 2023, Huawei demonstrated its latest ultra-high performance 400G solution to global operators and industry analysts. Lab tests verified its 7000 km transmission without regeneration, once again setting a new industry record. At the same time, Huawei announced that its full series of 400G WDM solutions have been put into commercial use on a large scale worldwide, with its global market share remaining the largest among all vendors.

1. The 400G era has arrived: capacity doubled over same distance

Currently, services such as HD videos and high-speed cloudification are driving continuous growth of network traffic. Omdia, a market research institute, predicts that network traffic will increase by more than 30% every year. To make such traffic growth economically viable, operators need to continuously reduce per-bit costs. According to the Shannon’s theorem, the transmission distance is inversely proportional to the spectral efficiency. This means that simply improving the spectral efficiency to increase the channel capacity will weaken the transmission capability. Instead, innovative technologies are required. Each generation of the optical transmission industry must multiply the single-wavelength capacity and single-fiber capacity while keeping the transmission distance the same. This is the rule that optical transmission networks followed over the past 20 years as they upgraded from 10G to 40G, 100G, and 200G.

With the maturity of technologies such as 400G QPSK modulation and C+L ultra-broadband spectrum, the single-wavelength 400G transmission capability will be equivalent to that of 100G/200G in 2023. When optical signals are transmitted over a long distance, the single-fiber capacity will be increased to 32 Tbit/s (80λ x 400G), double the 16 Tbit/s in the 200G era. The upgrade from 100G/200G to 400G also significantly reduces the per-bit cost. This is why a growing number of operators are choosing 400G. Indeed, we can say that the 400G WDM era has arrived.

2. Huawei’s full series of 400G WDM solutions: three technological innovations lead industry development

As early as 2017, Huawei’s 400G WDM solution has been put into commercial use globally, winning the “Best Optical Product – 400G and Above” award at the NGON Forum in June 2017. To meet differentiated customer requirements in different scenarios, Huawei has continuously innovated over the years and developed a full series of leading 400G WDM solutions.

• In February 2020, Huawei launched the industry’s first ultra-large-capacity 400G solution. This solution uses the s16QAM modulation technology with a baud rate of 90G+ to triple the 400G transmission distance to 3000 km, meeting the requirements of regional backbone and metro scenarios. It also supports 400G to 800G programmable modules, achieving the industry’s best spectral efficiency of 8 bit/s/Hz and maximizing the single-fiber capacity.
• In February 2022, Huawei launched the ultra-high integration 400G solution, which reduces the size of 400G modules by 2/3 and reduces power consumption by 50% while keeping the transmission distance unchanged.
• In 2023, Huawei launched the ultra-high-performance 400G solution. This solution uses the QPSK modulation technology with a baud rate of 140G+ to double the 400G transmission distance, meeting the requirements of national and international backbone networks.

Huawei’s full series of 400G WDM solutions continuously lead the industry development through three technological innovations:

• Industry’s first nonlinear compensation algorithm, enabling ultra-high-performance 400G

Huawei reduces the complexity of the fiber nonlinear compensation algorithm by 10 times and successfully implements the algorithm in 400G commercial modules. This is the first commercial use of the fiber nonlinear compensation algorithm in the optical transmission field, paving the way for the ultra-high-speed optical transmission technology.

• Industry’s first five-in-one optical component (COSA), enabling ultra-high integration 400G

Huawei integrates five separate optical components in a 400G module into a single optical component 1 cm² in size. This reduces the size and power consumption of the optical component greatly, and the connection loss between components by 90%, ensuring better signal transmission performance.

• Ultra-broadband optical amplifier, driving up the single-fiber capacity to 96 Tbit/s

In 2019, Huawei successfully put Super C-band ultra-broadband optical amplifiers into commercial use, expanding the available spectrum of optical fibers from 4.8 THz to 6 THz. In 2023, Huawei will put Super L band ultra-broadband optical amplifiers into commercial use for the first time. This will further expand the available spectrum of optical fibers to 12 THz. Combined with Huawei’s single-wavelength 800G solution, the single-fiber capacity can be increased by 42% to 96 Tbit/s.

In the information era, the optical transmission network is the communication infrastructure for both life and production, as well as the foundation of the digital economy. Looking ahead, Huawei will continue to strengthen technological innovation to help operators prepare for the explosion of traffic in the digital era, reduce costs and improve efficiency, jointly build future-oriented digital infrastructure, and enable the development of new services with ultimate experience in the future.