25 July 2023

Sumitomo Electric Industries, Ltd. has improved the transmission loss of terrestrial optical fiber cables using PureAdvance^TM-110, a pure-silica-core, low-loss, large effective-area (A_eff) fiber. These cables have been selected for a data center interconnect (DCI) project, and the delivery has recently been completed.

With increasing data traffic in trunk networks and between data centers, there is growing demand for broadband optical transport networks, and accordingly, optical fiber cables with improved performances, such as lower transmission loss, are increasingly required.

Since 2017, Sumitomo Electric has been commercially supplying the low-loss, large A_eff pure-silica-core fiber PureAdvance^TM-110 and optical fiber cables using it for terrestrial trunk transmission lines.^*1 These fiber cables are compliant with Recommendation ITU-T G.654.E^*2 and suitable for long-haul high-capacity optical signal transmissions thanks to their superior performances of low transmission loss and large A_eff.
To achieve even lower transmission loss, Sumitomo Electric applied ultra-low-loss pure-silica-core fiber technologies.^*3 As a result, the transmission loss of optical fiber cables using PureAdvance^TM-110 has been improved from 0.17 dB/km to 0.16 dB/km or below (typical value at a wavelength of 1550 nm), making it the world’s lowest transmission loss for terrestrial cables.^*4

The terrestrial optical fiber cables using PureAdvance^TM-110 have been selected for a wide-area DCI project connecting data center clusters in Tokyo, Kanagawa, and Chiba (Fig. 1), and the delivery has been completed. The outstanding low-loss performance of these cables enables to construct extremely low-loss transmission links including a 157 km-long section with the total loss of as low as 36 dB after deployment (including splice and connector losses). This will allow for high-capacity data transmission between data centers and reduce the number of optical repeaters, realizing reliable transmission links with reduced overall system costs.


Sumitomo Electric will continue to develop and supply low-loss optical fiber cables, contributing to the realization of high-quality optical communication networks.

 

*1: Please refer to the following press release dated June 19, 2018 from Sumitomo Electric:
Sumitomo Electric Commences Shipping of Terrestrial Optical Fiber Cable Made of Low-Loss, Large Effective Area Fibers
https://global-sei.com/company/press/2018/06/prs046.html

*2: Recommendation ITU-T G.654.E
ITU-T (International Telecommunication Union - Telecommunication Standardization Sector) is an organization that develops ITU-T Recommendations as international standards for infrastructure of information and communication technologies (ICTs). G.654.E is a category of ITU-T Recommendation that describes a cut-off shifted optical fiber and cable for terrestrial applications, designed to support digital coherent transmission systems with a bit rate of 100 Gb/s or higher.

*3: Please refer to the following press release dated March 22, 2017 from Sumitomo Electric:
Sumitomo Electric Renews World Record of Lowest Loss Optical Fiber
https://global-sei.com/company/press/2017/03/prs029.html

*4: Based on Sumitomo Electric’s research