Integrated communications firm Openserve, and Huawei, a global ICT solutions provider, have jointly announced the successful deployment of a high-speed fibre packet and optical transport network.

According to a statement released by the companies, this will enable Openserve to respond to the exponential growth in demand for data services across South Africa, with trial results indicating a seven-fold increase in the speed of fibre deployment.

"The network will support 8Tbps per fibre, with one pair of fibre supporting 400 000 families with 20Mbps bandwidth per family concurrently. It uses a future-oriented Software Defined Networking (SDN) architecture based on IP and optical synergy. The core network deployment started in Gauteng and is currently being rolled out nationally," stated the companies.

Openserve is currently in the process finalisation phase before implementation and is investigating future services which would also use SDN architecture.

Alphonzo Samuels, CEO of Openserve, said, "We insisted on this architecture, when we began designing our packet and optical transport network in 2014.

"With the quick service provisioning and smart management that SDN brings, we can quickly develop more innovative services to meet various customer requirements, improving our competitive position in South Africa's telecom market. The successful deployment of the packet and optical transport network will be the first step in reconstructing our network architecture in the future. I am proud of my team and look forward to further successes in follow-up cooperation with Huawei."

David Wang, President of Huawei Network Product Line, said "We are honoured to provide Openserve with our leading SDN based transport solution which includes IP and optical transmission systems and a SDN controller. The long-term partnership between Openserve and Huawei is helping propel rapid development of the SDN industry. Huawei will continue to improve its innovative SDN solutions, helping Openserve achieve greater business success."

Openserve says it will continue to collaborate in SDN Innovation, from transport network to cloud service, in order to meet the challenges of a digital future.