Live webinar: May 2nd - OTN Switching at a crossroads – Where do we go from here?

Thursday May 2nd 2024 3:00 PM BST

Network operators first began adopting optical transport network (OTN) switching in the late 2000s as a higher-capacity alternative to synchronous optical networking (SONET) / synchronous digital hierarchy (SDH). Deployments accelerated alongside the adoption of 100G coherent optics in the early 2010s, however, there have been many capacity, technology, traffic, and service evolutions since then.

While some OTN transport functions, such as framing, encryption, and performance monitoring remain relevant for today’s networks, service providers are exploring ways to migrate from legacy designs including traditional core OTN switching to modern, distributed and open architectures. This webcast will explore the latest research findings, as well as the tradeoffs and benefits of these architectures.

Who should attend this free webinar?

Optical communications professionals responsible for the design, deployment, and maintenance of optical transport networks within network operator and communication service provider (CSP) businesses. If you’re a CEO, CTO, Head of Engineering, System Architect or anyone involved in optical transport networks who wants to find out more about new advances in architectures should register to attend this webinar.

Attendees will benefit from a review of the latest service provider research findings and network operator strategies regarding current and future network architectures, from our panel of experts. They will also learn about alternative and evolving network architectures and their tradeoffs including distributed OTN switching and IPoDWDM.

Speakers

Walid Wakim
CTO - Systems and Network Solutions, Infinera

Walid Wakim is Chief Technology Officer at Infinera in the Systems group. Walid’s 25+ years of industry experience has spanned hardware to software to system engineering to defining both optical and multi-layer network architectures. In his current role, Walid heads the office of the CTO, focusing on future system and network architectures.

He actively collaborates with network operators and vendors all around the world to create next-generation networking solutions and is actively involved with standards and open source forums. Walid also is a regular speaker at industry conferences, holds a number of patents, and has authored a number of papers in the International Engineering Consortium, IEEE, and OFC as well as for other major journals and industry conferences.

Tim Doiron 
Vice President, Solution Marketing, Infinera

Tim Doiron is Vice President, Solution Marketing at Infinera, where he leads a global team focused on  innovative networking solutions that include open optical networking, next-generation mobile transport,  and intelligent software automation. Tim brings more than 25 years of networking and telecommunications experience across business and  technical organisations, including roles in marketing, product management, and engineering in executive  and managerial roles at vendor and service provider companies, including Coriant, Tellabs, ARRIS, Cadant,  Ericsson, and AT&T Mobility. Tim was also a Principal Analyst at ACG Research.

Tim is a frequent speaker  at industry conferences and has authored numerous articles. He holds an MBA from Webster University, an M.S. in electrical engineering from Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, and a B.S. in  electrical engineering from Southern Illinois University. He also holds eight patents and is a member of IEEE and Optica (formerly OSA).  

Sterling Perrin
Senior Principal Analyst, Optical Networks & Transport, Heavy Reading

Sterling Perrin is a Senior Principal Analyst within Heavy Reading, which delivers custom research and analysis for the telecommunications industry. His area of coverage is transport, including optical networks, packet networks, and 5G transport.

Sterling has more than 20 years' experience in telecommunications as an industry analyst and journalist. Sterling joined Heavy Reading after five years at IDC, where he served as lead optical networks analyst, responsible for the firm's optical networking subscription research and custom consulting activities. Prior to IDC, Sterling worked for Standard & Poor's, where he delivered global industry analysis on a range of IT segments.

Moderated by a member of the Fibre Systems editorial team