The trial marks an important step forward in the development of 100 Gigabit technologies to support ever-increasing bandwidth demand worldwide.

The trial consisted of prototype 100GbE client interfaces in Infinera systems in London and Frankfurt. The 100GbE service was passed over the 861 kilometer route from London to Frankfurt on Colt's low latency network. The prototype Infinera 100GbE interfaces are fully compliant with the industry standard ratified in June 2010, known as IEE 802.3ba. Testing and verification of the transmission were performed with an EXFO FTB-85 100 Gigabit/second (Gb/s) Packet Blazer tester.

Colt's Chief Technology Officer, Luke Broome, commented: "We were pleased to work with Infinera on the first trial of this equipment in Europe. It is important that we support the development of next generation optical transport technologies that will allow us to meet customer demand for very high speed Ethernet services."

Two weeks ago, Infinera announced the successful completion of a field trial involving next-generation photonic integrated circuits (PICs) successfully transmitting and receiving 100 Gigabit (100G) communications across a 1348 kilometer live network in the US. The next generation of Infinera PICs will have data capacity of 500 Gb/s. Infinera is moving aggressively to develop all the technologies required to deliver next generation optical systems to support exponentially growing bandwidth demand with the scalability and disruptive economics of photonic integration.

"Infinera's 100GbE interfaces, our 500G PICs delivering 100G channels over the long-haul network, and our Bandwidth Virtualization capability to manage this bandwidth more flexibly and efficiently will enable us to deliver next-generation optical systems that can scale to meet the needs of our customers and the global Internet with the unique scalability and disruptive economics of photonic integration," commented Infinera co-founder and Chief Technology Officer Drew Perkins. "We are tremendously excited to be working with Colt as we develop our next generation systems."

EXFO provided the test equipment for the 100GbE trial. "We are extremely pleased to partner with Colt and Infinera on their first 100GE field trial between London and Frankfurt by providing them the tools needed to meet the demand for consistent Ethernet signal quality and network performance with the industry's only portable testing solution -- the FTB-85100G Packet Blazer," said Etienne Gagnon, EXFO's Vice-President -- Wireline Division and Corporate Marketing.