Alcatel-Lucent said it had satisfied Italian operator TIM's need for ultra-broadband connectivity between two Sicilian islands by using its microwave radio platform.
The infrastructure company said it has deployed a 147 km microwave link between the islands of Pantelleria and Lampedusa that will improve the reliability of legacy and IP services. The rollout utilises Alcatel-Lucent's 9500 Microwave Packet Radio platform, which the company said offers capacity of 800 Mbps.
Alcatel-Lucent added that the radio platform deployed offers a viable alternative to fibre networks, and would be used to provide telephony and ultra-broadband services to residents, businesses and visitors to each island.
Benedetto Di Salvo, Alcatel-Lucent's key account director covering Telecom Italia, said microwave technology is an effective means of overcoming "connectivity challenges in the most complex environments."
Di Salvo added that Alcatel-Lucent is providing "high-quality ultra-broadband connectivity" for all consumers on the islands through a mix of "access, backhaul and transport technology."
The infrastructure company separately announced the expansion of its IP edge routing portfolio with the unveiling of a new series of cloud-ready IP routers it said would expand the benefits of its 7750 Service Router family further into the network.
Alcatel-Lucent said its 7750 SR-e service router would help service providers cope with the rapid shift to cloud-based operations, the Internet of Things (IoT) and other developments that are increasing demand for bandwidth such as ultra high definition (UHD) video -- all of which the company said are increasing the burden placed on aggregation networks.
The new router will assist operators as they push more edge services out from centralised locations to a distributed architecture involving a number of smaller locations to account for that growing pressure, the company explained.
Basil Alwan, president of Alcatel-Lucent's IP Routing and Transport business, said the new router was developed to meet future needs of the company's operator customers.
"Our 'Network Function Optimization' approach recognises that virtualised and integrated routing solutions will be required for different applications, and that choice will be dictated by the economics and architectural preference of each network operator," Alwan said.
For more:
- see Alcatel-Lucent's TIM announcement
- view this related IP router release
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