Nokia Siemens unveiled the latest release of its Surpass hiT 7300 metro/regional network platform today, boosting capacity for ultralong-haul links and extending its reach further into metro optical networks.

Ushered into the US two years ago as a “little brother” to the long-haul 7500 deployed by AT&T and others, the “multi-haul” 7300 was designed to blur the line between long-haul and metro networks, consistent with similar moves from the likes of Nortel Networks and Ciena.

The newest release, announced today and available in the fourth quarter, supports 80 channels over up to 3000 kilometers rather than 40 (using 50 gHz spacing between wavelengths rather than 100 gHz), giving it ultralong-haul reach. New 40-Gb/s interfaces bring its total capacity to 3.2 terabits per second. And a new customer premises device allows the delivery of wavelengths directly to end users.

“On one side, we extended the reach to the long haul; on the other side, we were able to extend it into the [customer] premises,” said Hans-Juergen Schmidtke, head of NSN’s fixed operators group. “This extends our market reach drastically.”

According to Ovum analyst Ron Kline, the improvements may mean the 7300 has surpassed its big brother in NSN’s portfolio.

“I figured this was the end for the 7500,” Kline said in an email today. “It does not seem to make sense to keep both platforms alive, since the 7300 can now do all that the 7500 can do. With these upgrades to the 7300, NSN should be able to compete more effectively since the 7500 was strictly [ultralong-haul].”

The new customer premises device for the 7300, the size of a pizza box, allows the delivery of a single wavelength (or more) to enterprise customers, using either coarse or dense wavelength division multiplexing.

The updated 7300 also includes new photonic crossconnect capabilities based on wavelength-selective switching (WSS), adding more mesh networking options to the platform’s fixed optical add/drop multiplexers and planar lightwave circuits. However, NSN won’t say publicly how many degrees its new WSS supports.

“We consider that as one of our key differentiators,” Schmidtke said. “But we feel right now that we don’t want to share that with the public. I wish I could just shout it out. But we don’t want to disclose that.”

According to NSN, the new features also further blur the line between metro and long-haul networks.

“Four or five years ago, we had regional and long-haul networks that were terminated -- now it’s one regional/long-haul network,” Schmidtke said. “We believe to a certain extent -- not everywhere or immediately -- with this product we could offer a transparent optical network wherever you want to have it, from the metro to the backbone.”