The Shift to Ethernet throughout the Wide Area Network Architecture

Jeff Wabik, Chief Technologist of Data Architecture, Ciena Corporation

Moderator: Brian Cashman, Internet2 Network Planning Manager

A shift is underway in Wide Area Networks. For years, SONET/SDH networks brought reliability and manageability to wide area networks. As bandwidth continues to increase and to shift to IP and other data protocols, the inflexibility and inefficiency of SONET topologies has become operationally and economically constraining.

For years Ethernet has brought flexibility, simplicity, high bandwidth and cost-effectiveness to local area networking. New standards and technologies for Ethernet and other network transport technologies can now allow the combination of the best characteristics of both Ethernet and transport layer technologies to enable institutions to build a unified network with performance and efficiency. This will allow the support continuingly increasing bandwidth demands with new IP- and Ethernet-based traffic (e.g. VoIP, Internet video, IPTV, IP-VPNs, MEF ELINE/ELAN) as well as many legacy services (e.g. FR, ATM, T1/E1, T3/E3).

In this webinar, Ciena, an Internet2 Corporate Partner, provided an overview of technology building blocks that form the basis Ethernet throughout the WAN architecture. The webinar defined the traditional Ethernet functions, identifed and positioned supporting technologies and necessary standards developments, weighed the pros and cons of several emerging technologies to make Ethernet more connection-oriented, and introduced new service architectures and best practices for consideration when implementing Ethernet wide area networks.

NOTE: This presentation contrasts from the previous Ethernet related presentation which was focused on issues around the demarcation device, not end to end architecture.

About the Speaker

Jeff Wabik
Vice President, Data Architectures, Office of the CTO
Ciena Corporation

Jeff Wabik is currently Vice President, Data Architectures for Ciena Corporation’s CTO Office, where he is responsible for the development of data offerings and strategy across the Company’s product portfolio.

Prior to joining Ciena, Mr. Wabik served as Chief Architect of the IP Switching Products Group for Lucent’s Internetworking Systems. In that role, he was responsible for developing a family of products and technologies to solve the needs of Lucent’s IP businesses, including core routing, MPLS, and Voice Over IP applications. Mr. Wabik joined Lucent in 1996 by acquisition of Netstar, where he was a primary architect of the first Multi-Gigabit Switch-Router, the Netstar GigaRouter. Previously, in 1987, Mr. Wabik co-founded MRNet, one of the first U.S. Internet service providers, and served as Executive Director and Chief Technical Officer until 1992