Deploying optical performance monitoring in TeliaSonera's network

Abstract

This paper reports on the first steps taken by TeliaSonera towards deploying optical performance monitoring (OPM) in the company’s transport network, in order to assure increasingly reliable communications on the physical layer. The big leap, a world-wide deployment of OPM still awaits a breakthrough. There is required very obvious benefits from using OPM in order to change this stalemate. Reasons may be the anaemic economy of many telecom operators, shareholders’ pushing for short-term payback, and reluctance to add complexity and to integrate a system management. Technically, legacy digital systems do already have a proven ability of monitoring, so adding OPM to the dense wavelength division multiplexed (DWDM) systems in operation should be judged with care. Duly installed, today’s DWDM systems do their job well, owing to rigorous rules for link design and a prosperous power budget, a power management inherent to the system, and a reliable supplier’s support. So what may bring this stalemate to an end? -A growing number of appliances of OPM, for enhancing network operation and maintenance, and enabling new customer services, will most certainly bring momentum to a change. The first employment of OPM in TeliaSonera’s network is launched this year, 2004. The preparedness of future OPM dependent services and transport technologies will thereby be granted.