Telia Carrier – Open Optical Networks and 400ZR

Cignal AI recently had the opportunity to meet with Telia Carrier, a wholesale internet carrier with operations in Europe and the USA. Telia Carrier is being spun off from the Swedish Incumbent Telia and will become an independent operating company on June 1^st, 2021.

A few years ago, the company began transitioning to more open optical and packet networking, de-emphasizing custom vendor hardware in favor of open line systems and Broadcom silicon-based switches. Together we discussed a range of topics:

• COVID’s impact on the network and plans for 2021
• The challenges of moving to open optical line systems
• Plans for deploying 400ZR and 400ZR+ pluggable coherent optics
• Huawei’s removal from Swedish networks