Coherent optics, photonic line programs, and software program brokers are serving to cloud suppliers and telco corporations to handle the explosive AI workload calls for on fiber networks – throughout cutting-edge interconnect programs, upgraded longhaul infrastructure, and rising cell entry networks. As advised to RCR by Ciena at MWC.
In sum – what to know:
Fiber-first scale – Ciena is unbundling its telco-grade optical fiber programs into interconnect pluggables for hyperscalers, helped by its Hyper Rail photonic line programs and $270m Nubis acquisition.
Software program good points – Its Blue Planet OSS and Navigator controller layer telemetry, automation, and agentic AI on prime of its WaveLogic optics to create programmable closed-loop cloth from cloud to edge.
Cellular entry – Blue Planet help for last-mile 5G entry means telcos can orchestrate AI workloads on the edge, supporting demand for devoted spectrum and mission-critical efficiency.
Right here’s a fast replay of a dialog with Ciena at MWC in the beginning of the month (March 2-5) – simply to make the e-newsletter reduce earlier than at the moment’s deadline (March 24). The 12-inch remix would possibly seem later this week, that includes higher traces and greater hooks – simply because some conversations are price telling correctly. Being MWC, the discuss is usually about fusty previous telco networks, reasonably than stylish new hyper-scale networks. However it begins with the ‘scale-across’ mission, per the AI business’s cloud priorities. “Proper now, all eyes are on that. As a result of all the things is occurring there; it’s this gravitational drive. And the large factor is the scale-across as knowledge facilities are extra distributed.”
Scale up, out, and throughout – because the narrative goes; to attach AI compute because it multiplies inside and between racks (‘up’ and ‘out’) in knowledge facilities till land and energy are used-up, and additional multiplication must be orchestrated ‘throughout’ longer distances between regional AI ‘factories’. I imply, that’s the solely AI-infrastructure story in telecoms, proper now – absolutely? About high-capacity fiber-optic interconnects for frontier fashions in scattered data-center clusters? Principally within the US, principally by cloud suppliers – and nothing a lot to do with cell in any respect? “Sure,” responds Rebecca Smith, senior vp of promoting at Ciena. “As a result of it must be, proper?” However give it time, she goes on.
“The info has to depart the information middle [at some point] to monetize anything-AI, proper – as inference strikes nearer to the place these fashions are used and consumed. Even on the edge, it has to exit to the person. Which is driving lots of attention-grabbing developments – as a result of the hyperscalers and neoscalers are investing massively in knowledge facilities, and a few [telco] service suppliers are too; and the service suppliers, nearer [to the edge] with regional networks, have entry to the tip customers. You would possibly suppose, you realize, the hyperscalers will dominate and disintermediate. However we don’t see that; these regional networks, particularly in markets like Europe, make telcos extremely invaluable companions on this.”
Nonetheless not cell, although – not a lot, and never but. Possibly ‘cell’ ought to simply be dropped from ‘MWC’ on the grounds that fastened telecoms issues extra proper now; all of the discuss 5G and 6G on the levels and stands feels slightly performative when hyperscalers are taking fiber build-outs into their very own arms, and essentially the most pressing enterprise conferences within the again rooms on the present flooring are concerning the flex and capability of latest fiber programs. Smith responds: “Sure, I’ve been coming for 20 years, and it’s a lot much less of a cell present now; it’s actually a basic telecoms present. However it has a unique lens on the AI alternative – versus OFC, say, the place we see extra hyperscalers.”
Fiber interconnects
At writing, the telco business’s large optical-fiber convention, OFC, has simply completed (March 7-11) in Los Angeles, in fact. (RCR has an OFC interview with Ciena, pending.) However each methods, Ciena has a captive market – with pressing east-west hyper-scale interconnect initiatives, per the OFC agenda, and semi-urgent north-south telco improve works, per the MWC dialogue; plus with cell backhaul, and even service OSS orchestration by way of its Blue Planet subsidiary. And 5G/6G issues, very clearly; Nokia (promoting as a lot optical componentry as cell radios, nowadays) stated on Sunday night time at MWC that 53.5 p.c of AI site visitors begins there. “[AI] is mobile-native,” it said.
However no query: fiber is the phrase in AI infrastructure in mid-2026, going forwards. Ciena’s buyer cut up is between ‘enterprises’ (telcos principally, and AT&T considerably, shopping for routing and switching merchandise and software program platforms), and cloud suppliers (hyperscalers and different AI manufacturing unit builders, shopping for optical merchandise and photonics). The pattern is in direction of the latter, plus a stronghold of purchasers like AT&T. However it has seen a surge amongst a couple of massive prospects; simply three contributed 43 p.c within the closing quarter of 2025, price 10-plus p.c of its full-year takings (up about 20 p.c; its first 2026 quarterlies are right here). Analysts cite “one of many strongest demand environments in its historical past” – for this hyperscale(-throughout) bump.
Which is pretty new, really – and has prompted Ciena to alter its product mannequin, away from built-in optical programs that slot into telco networks, to disaggregated modular constructing blocks and pluggable optics that match how hyperscalers construct infrastructure. It has simply (September 2025) acquired Nubis Communications for $270 million to herald compact optical and electrical interconnect tech for extremely‑excessive capability inside AI clusters.
“Optical transport is our bread-and-butter… We’re recognized for our systems-play on the telco aspect,” says Smith.
“The info middle is a unique alternative – about the right way to take our applied sciences and break them down into parts to get ultra-high capability in and across the knowledge middle.” So, Ciena has unbundled its telco-grade optical tech in different phrases so cloud suppliers can custom-build at hyper-scale. As a result of capability is exponential, and effectivity (energy, area, latency) is all the things. Which is the place belongings like its Hyper Rail system come into play: a brand new reconfigurable (RLS) photonic line structure that shifts the method from increasing a wavelength at a time to lighting up total fiber pairs (‘rails’) concurrently to fulfill the huge bandwidth calls for of AI workloads.
Wholesale fashions
As such, its transfer to deconstruct its telco proposition has come full circle; much less about dismantling functionality, extra about reformatting it – to align with the pluggable software-driven infrastructure fashions of the hyperscale period, now going quicker and wider with new AI {dollars}. However we’re at MWC, and the discuss is about telcos in all of this. It’s humorous as a result of AT&T, Colt, Lumen, Verizon, Vodafone, Zayo – and many others – all discuss like they’re connecting to knowledge facilities, and even dealing with a number of the scale-across. “It’s not like a tough line – like hyperscalers at this many kilometers, service suppliers from right here. It relies upon the place it’s, as properly – North America versus Europe, say,” responds Smith.
She provides: “However hyperscalers are positively investing in these scale-across architectures, and, then, there are corridors in Asia Pacific the place see lots of these MOFN networks throughout very massive distances – which, you could possibly argue, is scale-across. So that they positively have a task in that worth chain, proper?” We’re going south, rapidly, into terrestrial and subsea longhaul programs – which (bar most new subsea builds) stay the provenance of conventional telcos, together with some with cell RAN setups hooked up to the ends. That is the mostly-fiber dialogue at MWC.
Intriguingly, some right here (Deutsche Telekom, say) are additionally organising new hyperscale-homes, full to the rafters with GPUs, in their very own regional community strongholds. “Particularly in markets like Europe, the place sovereignty and safety are such large matters,” says Smith. “The place the regional service suppliers have networks that the hyperscalers don’t – which, once more, makes them extremely invaluable companions.” As such, there may be rising curiosity in wholesale-style MOFN (managed optical fibre community) leasing fashions to safe wavelengths for AI workloads – extending to darkish fibre and managed spectrum, and even outsourced work (the place telcos take cost of the first-mile to get the power on-line).
“These fashions have been round for years, however we’re seeing numerous variations due to AI, the place hyperscalers need entry to those regional networks to carry all the things to the sting. We’re seeing numerous funding there; it’s good for service suppliers,” says Smith. Dynamic SD-WAN controls for throttling bandwidth up and down are additionally in demand. However how do ‘regional’ telcos – with metro infrastructure, backhaul and longhaul, some subsea pairs, wholesale offers throughout – limber up, and even match the programmable efficiency that deep-pocketed cloud corporations are lighting-up between knowledge facilities?
Twin applied sciences
The reply is this mix of coherent optics and photonic line programs, the place the transmission know-how encodes knowledge onto mild alerts with superior modulation and error correction (permitting enormous volumes to journey lengthy distances effectively), and the transmission infrastructure carries and routes the alerts throughout the community (because the ‘freeway’ for the coherent ‘site visitors’, to make use of a regular throughput analogy) – from longhaul north-south routes to shorter-haul interconnect hyperlinks within the cloud and metro programs on the edge. Ciena frames it in elementary phrases: “what issues” in any AI community, says Smith, continues to be power-efficiency per kilometre and value per bit.
The distinction – abruptly, more and more – is how these twin necessities, technical and financial, are being met throughout fragmented international fiber infrastructure that was designed for the web. Its WaveLogic platform, the model for its coherent optics resolution, is being developed in two R&D tracks. Its newest (sixth-gen) Wavelogic 6 product is accessible as an embedded system for routers and switches in longhaul telco networks and as pluggable interconnect parts for “shorter-reach” knowledge middle utilization, now enhanced with the Nubis know-how. “We’re seeing rising demand on either side,” says Smith. “We’re uniquely positioned out there proper now.” Ciena has extra, in fact.
Bodily infrastructure is half the story, says Smith. The problem is to run the community effectively, at scale. “Which is lots of what we now have talked about right here. Service suppliers have talked about effectivity for years. The distinction is it’s not nearly competitiveness, anymore; it’s an EBITDA crucial for the c-suite. That’s the shift – which opens up conversations about automation and autonomy.” However it’s a chicken-and-egg deal. “You want the community for that,” says Smith. “Scalability, capability, programmability – which comes with the Wavelogic know-how. You then want the software program on prime, which has the telemetry, understands the calls for on the community, and brings the intelligence.”
That software program is available in two layers: an on-box area controller (Navigator) for its personal fiber infrastructure, and a multi-vendor fiber/cell OSS layer (courtesy of Blue Planet). “We will sense what is occurring throughout a community, whether or not it’s a Ciena optical community or a third-party routing community..” By layering in agentic AI, Smith says Ciena can now purpose over its inputs, as properly: decoding telemetry, understanding SLAs and enterprise aims, and recommending or executing actions to reallocate assets, resolve alarms, or modify site visitors flows. “We now have a closed-loop programmable method to handle the community. That’s the sort of dialog we’re having at MWC.”
Software program automation
Telcos used to depend on guide spreadsheets and truck rolls, she says. “Now, it’s programmable, and more and more autonomous.” The identical software program works for last-mile cell entry, too – the place the towers be part of the fiber backhaul, going into the longhaul; the place Ciena’s optics come into play. Blue Planet crosses each disciplines; past visibility and telemetry, it additionally helps 5G slicing (deployed with Deutsche Telekom, for example). Smith says: “AI may very well be the killer app for… properly, I imply, we’ve been attempting to determine the killer slicing app ceaselessly – but it surely may very well be AI. Consider healthcare, or numerous industries, the place you want low latency and devoted spectrum to run an AI utility.
She goes on: “These are the desk stakes for lots of AI –one hundred pc uptime, no interruptions; mission vital. That’s the place slicing comes into play. Loads of AI functions solely make sense with next-to-no latency. So AI would possibly drive that; it may very well be tremendous invaluable for enterprises, proper? So it’s not that AI is enabling that slice, however that AI will drive the necessity for the slice. And Blue Planet permits the service supplier, assuming it has the bandwidth, to provision and orchestrate that slice.” There’s agentic AI in there, presumably – so the Blue Planet proposition extends its father or mother’s “closed-loop, programmable method” from the information middle to the sting.
She says: “Agentic AI is altering the dialog as a result of it permits telcos to go quicker. The very fact you could possibly create an agent, inform an agent what to do in your working atmosphere with none coding is phenomenal, proper? You don’t want an information scientist to try this. You don’t want an skilled engineer. You might simply have anyone in a NOC say, ‘that is my agent; go do that’. The potential for that’s actually limitless for the service suppliers.” The dialog skirts round a complete lot extra apart from, however we now have to carry it to an in depth. And, in order that’s it – the lengthy participant; there by no means was a single model, in any case. Simply to complete, Smith notes the distinction in telcos, MWC 2026 versus 2025.
She displays: “Like I stated, AI is that this gravitational drive, which is pulling hyperscaler funding and repair supplier funding behind it. Should you’re a part of the ecosystem, it’s an attention-grabbing time. And the paths to alternative are clearer, now. Final 12 months, we have been nonetheless like: what does it imply? We now perceive that higher – the way it’s taking part in out. And never simply within the knowledge middle, however with actual alternatives for service suppliers – whether or not it’s a wholesale MOFN factor, or an industrial cloud in Germany. This business is figuring it out, proper? Which doesn’t imply that all the things is found out, in fact, as a result of it’s going to evolve. It’s like that iceberg cliche, the place there’s a lot extra beneath the floor.”
