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  "path": "/article/4144483/cisco-grows-high-end-optical-support-for-ai-clusters.html",
  "publishedAt": "2026-03-12T18:24:43.000Z",
  "site": "https://www.networkworld.com",
  "tags": [
    "Artificial Intelligence, Enterprise Routers, Network Switches, Networking, Networking Devices",
    "network infrastructure",
    "blog",
    "QSFP-DD",
    "Acacia",
    "QSFP28",
    "actively growing",
    "optical portfolio",
    "Linear Pluggable Optics"
  ],
  "textContent": "Cisco has taken the wraps of new optical gear aimed at supporting the advanced network infrastructure required to handle distributed AI workloads.\n\n“AI is fueling exponential traffic growth, exposing traditional data center boundaries, and pushing workloads across networks. Training the largest frontier AI models now requires connecting multiple data centers and overcoming power and space limitations that once constrained centralized architectures,” wrote Bill Gartner, senior vice president and general manager of Cisco’s Optical Systems and Optics group in a blog about the news. “As the industry shifts from scale-out in single data centers to scale-across distributed locations, new networking paradigms are essential.”\n\nGartner added that AI optics will be the main growth contributor to the data center optics market over the next five years and that by 2030, AI optics total addressable market (TAM) will exceed $20B/year with AI applications requiring high-speed optical throughputs supporting 400G, 800G, 1.6T, 3.2T.\n\nTaking aim at those issues and the central piece of the new Cisco optics is the Open Transport 3000 Series, a multi-rail open line system that integrates optical components for multiple fiber rails into a single line card, providing exponential improvements in power and density for hyperscalers, neocloud operators, and very high-end enterprise AI applications, Gartner stated.\n\nMulti-rail open line systems sit between routers or switches and the long-distance fiber network and act as the optical transport layer connecting the network gear to fiber links. The 3000 Series is part of Cisco’s optical networking portfolio, designed to move large volumes of data across fiber networks between routers, data centers, and metro/long-haul infrastructure, Gartner stated.\n\n“While using existing line systems in legacy amplification huts limits the maximum achievable capacity due to power constraints, multi-rail open line systems enable the use of several parallel fiber pairs, which significantly increase capacity and power efficiency. By integrating multi-rail amplifiers, operators can easily scale to accommodate multi-petabit traffic, while reducing physical footprint and overcoming power constraints,” wrote Lorenzo Ghioni, vice president of product management with Cisco Optics in a blog. “Another way to keep power under control and maximize fiber utilization is to extend the conventional or C-band architectures with C & L [Long-band], effectively doubling capacity per fiber pair.”\n\nCisco has also upgraded its Network Conversion System (NCS) with a 1RU, 800GE line card offering 12.8T capacity, with 32 OSFP-based ports for 100GE, 400GE, and 800GE clients and 800ZR/ZR+ WDM trunks. The NCS 1014 doubles the density of previous-generation NCS versions and now includes MACsec encryption (IEEE 802.1AE) to secure point-to-point links with hardware-based encryption, data integrity, and authentication for Ethernet traffic, Ghioni stated. It supports enhanced capacity and performance with C&L-band support and NCS 1014 systems with the 2.4T WDM line card based on the Coherent Interconnect Module 8 and now supports 800 GE clients, which can be mapped directly to a wavelength or inverse multiplexed across two wavelengths to maximize reach, Ghioni wrote.\n\nIn the pluggable optic arena, Cisco is now offering a Quad Small Form Factor Pluggable Double Density (QSFP-DD) Pluggable Protection Switch Module that can monitor the optical link and switch traffic if it detects a fault in less than 50 milliseconds. The module occupies a quarter of the rack space compared to traditional protection devices—offering 90% rack space saving over available options, Ghioni wrote. It is aimed at Metro and DCI network customers where sub-50 ms failure recovery is essential and data centers needing fiber protection without bulky hardware, Ghioni stated.\n\nCisco also added its Acacia developed Bright QSFP28 100ZR 0 dBm coherent optical pluggable in a standard QSFP28 form factor. It is aimed at edge, access, enterprise, and campus network deployment.\n\nCisco has been actively growing its optical portfolio  recently adding the Cisco Silicon One G300, which powers 102.4T N9000 and Cisco 8000 systems, as well as advanced 1.6T OSFP optics and 800G Linear Pluggable Optics.",
  "title": "Cisco grows high-end optical support for AI clusters"
}