Transforming Network Infrastructure Week in Review: Corning, Hudson Fiber, Steel ORCA

Network infrastructure is a lot like road surface; we generally don't think about it unless something goes wrong, but at the same time, without it, many of our greatest advancements would be dead. That means a closer look at transforming network infrastructure becomes all the more important, and this week, we had plenty of news from that front. So with a weekend afoot, we have a chance to settle in and run down some of the biggest events from the week that was with our Week in Review coverage!

First, we had a look at Corning, which brought out its new EDGE8 optical cable solution. Specifically geared toward data centers, it's being called the first ever modular system using optical cabling throughout that starts with a Base-8 design at its core. With the eight-fiber design, the density per rack unit involved climbs, and makes the entire system much more scalable as well as providing better connectivity as well.

Next came a look at the cloud infrastructure market as a whole, as IDC offered up some analysis on the field. We already knew that the cloud infrastructure market was seeing big gains thanks to developments like big data, the bring your own device (BYOD) concept and mobility, but there was more to the growth than met the eye. Three major growth vectors for cloud infrastructure, the report noted, were public cloud operations, the data center, and cloud-based services. Cloud infrastructure spending should hit $54.6 billion annually by 2019, showing the true breadth of this market's opportunity.

The growth of fiber brought in the next bit of news as Hudson Fiber Network turned to the subways of New York City as a means to help bring in its bulk cable installation to Manhattan. Several new data center operations and commercial buildings now have access to a fiber connection, which is increasingly necessary to accommodate the large amounts of data that data centers must process. New York's huge rank in online traffic makes it clear why fiber access is increasingly important.

Then we had a look at the 25GE port, which was poised to become a major part of the converged data center network adapter market. By just 2019, reports suggest, 25GE ports will represent about nine percent of adapter ports shipped. Large cloud services providers will find the 25/100GE architecture attractive, reports suggest, and will move away from 10GE switching to the 25GE variety.

Finally, Steel ORCA brought the last bit of news, working with Avaya Fabric Connect to standardize its data center architecture. Since Avaya Fabric Connect is a software-defined networking (SDN) solution, Steel ORCA can build service environments that are not only simpler to run and operate, but are also sufficiently powerful to meet the needs of users. A full launch of the Avaya SDN Fx deployment is set to arrive later this year.

That was the week that was in transforming network infrastructure, and clearly, the thing perhaps most responsible for so much of our everyday lives had a lot of developments afoot. Our global online community was always ready to bring back the latest in news on this front, so be sure to join us back here next week for more, and every weekend as well for our Week in Review coverage!