The world's first deployment of 40G optical technology was successfully tested by Southern Cross Cables and Nortel, across a long distance submarine cable network.

Two separate trials were conducted by Southern Cross with Nortel over its trans-Pacific cable system linking Australia/New Zealand with Hawaii and the US West Coast. Southern Cross was one of the first operators to install 40G technology on the terrestrial portion of its network.

Nortel said: "The first trial was conducted over a 4,200km submarine segment between California and Hawaii. The second even more demanding trial was conducted over Southern Cross' longest route, 8000km between Auckland, New Zealand and Hawaii."

It should be noted that Nortel equipment was added to both ends of the third-party submarine cable, on both trials, with Nortel able to demonstrate the ability to provide over four times the existing bandwidth capacity, without the need to replace or upgrade the submarine cable or undersea repeaters.

Anthony McLachlan, vice president, Carrier Networks, Nortel Asia concluded, "Nortel's 40G technology provides the region's major broadband providers like Southern Cross the means to supply their customers with the network scalability they need well into the future."