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The Future Face Of Networks

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DQI Bureau
New Update

The

role of the network in the organization is increasing with the added dimension

of the internet. With intranets and the internet, the company network today is a

possible substitute for the sales and marketing functions. Typically, the

spending on management information systems by US companies has been 1% of their

revenue. An equivalent figure for sales and marketing has been 25-35%. If the

networks take over this function, the spending on IT will increase tremendously

over the next few years. Another way of looking at this is, if something like

50% of the total selling price of any product goes to manufacturing, the balance

goes to distribution. If the net takes over distribution it again means

considerably higher spending on IT. And in the US alone, the retail business

itself is worth over $1.5 trillion annually.

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As this happens the end user will

want to use only the simple browser on his desk. The real and more complex

technology will go into the network. Just as the electronic circuitry moved into

the chip, the computer will now move into the network. And as networks become

immensely powerful they will reward excellence. Good news will travel incredibly

fast rewarding the winners. But so will bad news. This means mediocrity will get

harshly punished. And because the internet is a global phenomenon, it will

unsettle economies which have so far worked on the basis of isolation. In many

ways the fundamentals of economies are already being challenged. Earlier when

people earned more they spent more, and this led to inflation since the methods

of buying and selling did not change. Now the methods of selling are changing.

You can buy more and more for lesser and lesser. Therefore, inflation gets

contained even as earnings go up.

Dial-tone networks

To make this

economy happen you need two things–computing and bandwidth. Computers have

progressed a lot in the last few years, but networks and bandwidth are in an era

which the mainframes were in a few years back. Mainframes required large

investment, long periods of return on investment and greater lock-in periods for

investments to pay off. The PC has changed all that.

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However, really elaborate

networks work the same way even today. A 2.5Gb pipe between Los Angeles and Las

Vegas may still take six months to set up, cost $200,000 a month and need a

10-year lock-in period. This worked fine till voice became the key usage. Now

one multimedia transaction may need the equivalent of 10,000 phone calls. Again,

if the networks have to deliver transactions in the commercial workplace you

need bandwidth that can help you buy what you want where you want it. The

challenge for service providers is therefore not only to build bandwidth but

also be able to effectively distribute it when and where it is desired. This

also needs networks which work in an evolving manner, are cost effective and

flexible, and are scalable as per customer needs.

The network now has to work in a

transactional dial tone mode, like the telephone instrument which works when you

lift the handset–you get the dial tone and you pay for usage. Bandwidth has to

work very much the same way. Available when you want it, unlimited for the

duration that you need it and paid for on a transaction basis with no lock-in

periods for years for the purchasers of bandwidth. It has to become a tradable

commodity where the creators of bandwidth sell it through intermediaries to

those who want it at any point of time.

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Make networks intelligent

You need

intelligent optical networks. Networks that will be able to process much higher

amounts of data traffic in an intelligent manner with efficient network

management. Today’s networks do that but only for the voice domain–not for

the increased data traffic of the future. This will need both hard optics and

soft optics. Hard optics in the form of optics-based equipment that push in more

traffic through pipes without constant repeat cycles and noise distortions. Soft

optics in the form of software that will provide traffic management required at

the access, transport and switching levels of network management. Electrical

signals will have to be converted to optical ones and transported through fiber

channels over long distances taking alternative routes when required. The ideal

situation, of course, would be not to need to convert at all, but that needs

optical computing. And that is still 5-10 years away.

The interim answer

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In the meantime,

existing networks have to be beefed up in a non-intrusive way. This can be done

by providing intelligent optical equipment that cut down the need for

regeneration of signals along the way and make them travel longer distances.

This also provides for routing of optical signals along paths where bandwidth is

available in real time. And most of all it helps increase the existing bandwidth

on optical channels at a much quicker pace. Thus, carriers of information will

be able to deliver bandwidth on a per transaction basis rather than on a fixed

basis.

The new revenue opportunities in

the optical framework today are the point-to-point optical wave services,

optical virtual private networks and gigabyte-level wave services. These will

need new blending of hardware and software solutions, which over the next 12-24

months should be able to deliver cost-effective solutions for the explosive

growth that data networks are going to need if the internet economy has to

happen.

In summary, intelligent optical

networking will reshape economies of the global public network, transform raw

capacity in the network into usable, economical and manageable bandwidth for the

delivery of new services, and enable a new generation of high-speed data

services over networked lightpaths.

A Dataquest

report from New Orleans, Louisiana, USA, and New Delhi.

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