Subsea Fiber Solutions with Multi-Core Fiber

The requirement for bandwidth is expanding at an exponential rate as a result of the increasingly digital nature of the world. The bandwidth-carrying fiber optic cables that run under the ocean and connect the continents will need to be upgraded properly. Because of this, along with our other partners in the industry, we are always searching for inventive methods to pack more information into each cable.

Multi-Core Fiber in Subsea

This will increase the network’s resilience and capacity for cloud providers like us, as well as network operators that serve people all over the globe. Today, we are going to go into one of the most recent developments in subsea cable technology, which is known as multi-core fiber (MCF) technology.

To begin, a quick review of the past. In the case of conventional undersea cables, the shore end is where the electricity originates. During the course of the data’s journey down the length of the cable, an individual set of pump lasers serves to amplify the optical signal for each fiber pair.

The development of space-division multiplexing (SDM) technology in recent years made it possible for undersea cable systems to keep up with the ever-growing demand by expanding the number of fibers contained inside the cable. As a result, these systems were able to provide a greater overall capacity at a rate that was less expensive per bit.

However, the present SDM technology is beginning to have difficulties with its scalability. It is impossible to increase the number of fibers in each cable without also increasing the outside diameter of the cable, which would need more material and weight, making it more difficult to do maritime operations and maintenance. In addition to this, the production process, the testing process, and the repair process all take substantially longer when fibers are added.

The technology known as multi-core fiber, or MCF, is an advancement on the single-core optical fibers that are used today. The Taiwan-Philippines U.S. cable is a new system that was developed in conjunction with regional carriers Chunghwa Telecom, Innove (a subsidiary of Globe Group), and AT&T to link Taiwan, the Philippines, Guam, and California. Google and NEC are working together to deploy it on the cable. The industry of underwater cables has never before accomplished this feat.

MCF is an advancement on the existing generation of single-core optical fibers, which are characterized by having a rounded glass core that is encased in a glass cladding for the purpose of containing and transmitting light. With MCF, we are able to double the number of cores in the cladding, which results in a decrease in the cost per bit and the ability to transmit more light and information.

Everything in the same strand of fiber! MCF technology will also enable quicker manufacturing, testing, and maintenance operations since it includes fewer fibers in comparison to an equal number of cores implemented through standard single-core fibers. This will allow MCF technology to replace existing single-core fibers in many applications.

“This first implementation of MCF in submarine networks represents a fundamental milestone towards next-generation systems with larger capacity, more efficient connectivity, and lower cost/bit,” says Eduardo Mateo, Director of Technology Strategy at NEC. “This first implementation of MCF in submarine networks represents a fundamental milestone toward next-generation systems with larger capacity.”

We are delighted to have worked closely with NEC over the last decade to improve game-changing fiber-optic cable technology, and most recently to introduce MCF to the Taiwan-Philippines-U.S. cable system. This collaboration has allowed us to deliver MCF to the cable system that connects Taiwan, the Philippines, and the United States. We are looking forward to the development of a supply chain ecosystem that is capable of delivering MCF capabilities throughout the industry as single-core optical fiber cables transition to multi-core optical fiber cables (MCF).

We anticipate that multi-core fiber will be a significant component of the global telecommunications infrastructure in the coming years as the demand for online content, cloud services, and AI applications continues to rise. This is an exciting new route for cable capacity scaling, which will pave the way for significant increases in the number of cores per fiber in the future to fulfill the industry’s need for bandwidth.

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