Infinera and Hawaiki Submarine Cable LP, a subsidiary of BW Digital, announced the successful completion of a record-breaking trial on Hawaiki Cable. Leveraging Infinera’s ICE6 800G coherent optical solution, the trial achieved real-time subsea spectral efficiency of more than 4.5 bits per second per hertz (b/s/Hz) on an uncompensated cable spanning 15,000 km and connecting Australia and the United States.
This trial demonstrates the value of Infinera’s ICE6 solution in enabling subsea operators like Hawaiki to better serve their customers by increasing the capacity per fiber while simultaneously reducing the cost per bit and power per bit of delivering high-speed services. Conducted with Infinera’s GX Series Compact Modular Platform, featuring the ICE6 optical engine, the trial underscored the value of its unique features, including ultra-high baud rates, long-codeword probabilistic constellation shaping (LC-PCS), second-generation Nyquist subcarriers, and SD-FEC gain sharing.
Hawaiki also tested the integration of Infinera’s suite of software automation tools, including Intelligent Power Management (IPM) and Instant Bandwidth 2.0, which enable important capabilities such as smart cable automation, embedded spectrum sharing, and rapid service activation.
“As a carrier and vendor-neutral operator, we are consistently looking for the best technology to upgrade our network. This trial leveraging Infinera’s latest coherent optical solution proved that the Hawaiki cable system has been optimally designed and is capable of achieving record-breaking performance to deliver more capacity and open spectrum sharing capabilities, essential to meet our customers’ needs,” said Anaël Greiveldinger, Hawaiki’s Director of Engineering.
“Extending the capital life of important subsea assets for our customers remains a key goal of Infinera,” said Nick Walden, Senior Vice President, Worldwide Sales, Infinera. “We are excited about the results of this trial proving how ICE6 can significantly increase the number of services that can be delivered over long submarine infrastructure.”
