At the ATCA Summit 2012 in California, it was evident that 40G AdvancedTCA® solutions are ready for mass deployments, and that the demand for 40G switching blades is growing. Few ATCA solutions providers presented 40GE solutions in the 2011 show. Telco Systems, a pioneer in ATCA solutions, was among the few leaders to present such products, including the release of its award winning T-ATCA404 switch blade. With the completion of the 40G PICMG specification in 2012, more 40GE capable elements (blades, chassis and others) have been introduced. One interesting example is payload blades. We expect to see more of the market followers introducing new products that will be released only towards the end of 2013/beginning of 2014.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6NS7puTcwZE

In the last year we’ve seen our 40G blades being used in a variety of applications, but generally speaking, it seems that 40G systems get most of the attention in two  main verticals – mobile infrastructure (mainly LTE), and high-speed, high-throughput dataCom (mainly in the cloud/data center).

Mobile infrastructure has been going through major changes with the introduction of new technologies that are designed to allow mobile operators to overcome the need to offer high-bandwidth solutions. LTE deployments have been ramping up this year, with TEMs (Telecom Equipment Manufacturers) focused mainly around the Evolved Packet Core (EPC) and Node B, relying on ATCA systems and blades to provide the building blocks for the network.

As data centers become bigger and bigger, and throughput needs continue to increase, it seems that there is a growing need for a smart gateway to perform Deep Packet Inspection (DPI), while supporting firewalls, traffic analysis, and load balancing in the cloud, between the clouds, and between the cloud and the access network, providing an interesting opportunity for 40GE ATCA platforms.

The Summit also provided a stage for discussions regarding 100GE ATCA systems future direction. While it looks like 100GE backplanes, at the moment, far from being ready (not expected to perform until 2015), the need for 100GE uplinks required in the blades look to be approaching faster.

AdvancedTCA architecture has become a stream line option for variety of vendors and applications including LTE RAN, security, cloud services, policy access control, IPTV, IMS and other deep packet inspection.  Telco Systems has deployed its networking solution worldwide with variety of carriers and we knew that one of the toughest thing for application developer will be to handle the switching solution.

So we invested very early (in fact we were the first company to have ATCA based solution in the market in 2004) a lot of efforts to take our carrier expertise and to transport it to ATCA switching blade. However as switching blades with multi 40G capabilities are coming to the market.

It became obvious that the bottle neck has now moved to the CPU line blade, as they run in 10G rates. So for example ,in a 14 slot chassis,  Telco Systems 2 x HUB4 which has capability of 320G uplinks while backplane inter-connect with CPU blade that have maximum blade of 2x12x10G which result in only 240G. The meaning is 80GE are Blocked by CPU Blade .We expect this to be changed during 2012, as some vendors announced plans to release with new CPU blades with 2 ports of 40G to each blade. So while this will close the gap between the switch and the CPU blades ,we should expect it to turn around again in 2013 as 100G switch blades will start showing up in the market.

Related Info: What is AdvancedTCA and its deployment challenges

If you are ATCA developer, where would you want the bottle neck to be? (write to us in the comments)

The Advanced Telecom Computing Architecture (AdvancedTCA®) specifications are a series of PICMG (http://www.picmg.org/) specifications which target the requirements for the next generation of carrier grade communications equipment.  Based on PICMG 3.X specifications, AdvancedTCA solutions incorporate the latest trends in high speed interconnect technologies and next-generation processors that support high reliability, availability and serviceability.

Central to the ATCA architecture is the ATCA switch blade that provides inter-connectivity and external connectivity between ATCA peripheral line cards, the chassis, the management components and the backplane. Telco Systems’ AdvancedTCA switch blades offer not only advanced ultrahigh bandwidth with speeds of 10, 40 and 100G, but more importantly provides a full carrier grade Real Time Operating System (RTOS) deployed in carriers networks worldwide.

Applications like LTE RAN, security, cloud services, policy access control, IPTV, IMS and other deep packet inspection applications which run at 40G forces very stringent performance and scalability requirements. These requirements include highly variable bandwidth demands and traffic patterns which adversely impact system resources, further complicating product development.

By integrating networking capabilities such as traffic engineering MPLS/Ethernet, VPNs, OAM, and HQoS into off-the-shelf ATCA switch blades, system integrators, TEMS and NEPS can offer a networking solution that ensures high performance between blades and results in highly reliable and available communication within the network.  Integrators can focus on their core business, accelerate application development and shorten time to market.

Telco Systems brings home ATCA Award for its BiNOX operating system which powers the Company’s ATCA T-HUB switch blades.  The award was presented at the ATCA Summit event, held in San Jose November 1 and 2.

BiNOX is a carrier grade Real Time Operating System (RTOS) incorporated in the Company’s newest ATCA T-HUB4 switch blade.  BiNOX addresses the performance and scalability challenges for 40G applications such as LTE, security, cloud services, policy access control, IPTV, IMS and deep packet inspection. These new applications create highly variable bandwidth demands and traffic patterns which adversely impact system resources. Utilizing BiNOX’s wire speed, dynamic load balancing features, carriers not only optimize unpredictable traffic spikes across a 40G network, but also eliminate the need for separate load balancing appliances which add cost, latency and power to service provider’s networks.

Operating systems like BiNOX are unique to the ATCA market, because these new features are built into the software and ATCA switch blades. We can significantly shorten developer’s time to market while ensuring interoperability with other ATCA solution providers.

BiNOX enables carriers to realize inter-working advantages and efficiencies in their networks by providing a base platform upon which to build their complete system.  BiNOX offers extensive built-in networking capabilities, including switching, IPv4/IPv6 routing, MPLS, QoS, protection and redundancy, clock synchronization, and load balancing.  This field-proven carrier-grade networking operating system offers superior control and security while delivering wire-speed Layer 2-4 networking. BiNOX-enabled devices have been widely deployed in critical carrier, mobile operator and enterprise networks offered in the Company’s Carrier Ethernet products as well as the T-HUB ATCA switch blades.

AdvancedTCA Summit focuses on strategic directions for xTCA platforms in telecom central office, wireless systems, video processing, and military/defense applications. The Best of Show Awards program, now in its 5^th year, offers awards in four separate categories.  All entries are judged by a panel of industry experts based on distinctiveness of the application, technology, or product; central use of AdvancedTCA, MicroTCA and/or AMC modules; and technical and business significance.

Advanced Telecommunications Computing Architecture (ATCA or AdvancedTCA) is a standardized platform architecture for carrier-grade and high demand telecommunication applications. Its goal is to provide a higher level of performance and scalability using an open, multi-vendor architecture. Basically ATCA is all about Reliability, Availability and Serviceability (RAS). If you are unfamiliar with this standard and want to know more, you can find a wealth of information on this website.

The advantage of ATCA is that it has a high level of design flexibility and modularity.  ATCA enables the use of any blade in any slot on any platform size and supports multiple protocols at any bandwidth or rate.

ATCA is, in fact, the largest specification effort in the history, with more than 100 companies participating and has been adopted by a variety of industries.  It is heavily used by mobile vendors in the creation of 3G, LTE networks as well as multimedia services including IPTV. It is being adopted now for variety of other solutions including security and firewall applications for enterprise data centers, cloud gateways, as well as military, scientific and industrial use.

The upcoming ATCA Summit will be focusing on the strategic directions for ATCA and the challenges of delivering 40G and 100G applications which are putting a strain on today’s provider networks.  We’ll be showing our newest product, the T-HUB4 in San Jose where we’ll discuss how we can support connectivity of the enterprise to the carrier network at wire speed rates while applying quality of service and the applicable networking protocols that carriers require (MPLS, Ethernet HVPLS and HVPS, OAM and others). If your are not looking for 40G rates then you may want to take a look at the T-HUB2 which offer 10G rates.

We’ll be addressing more ATCA topics over the next few weeks including a review of the ATCA Summit and some interesting ATCA applications.

Click here if you would like to schedule a meeting with us at ATCA Summit, which will be held on Nov 1-2 at Doubletree, San Jose, CA