After initial adoption in long-haul transport applications, use of coherent technology has consistently progressed toward shorter reaches. Multi-haul solutions addressing network applications ranging from edge to submarine are available today, while standardized coherent interfaces in pluggable form factors are expected to drive wider adoption of coherent in even shorter reach applications.
At higher data rates, “coherent grey optics” will compete with direct detect in non-DWDM applications inside data centers. What are the advances necessary for widespread deployment of coherent in these high-volume applications and how will this impact future network architectures and development roadmaps?