As we wrap up 2023, we are looking back at some of Ciena’s most significant news and announcements from the year.

What a year 2023 was for Ciena. We shared new innovations with the world, celebrated customer and product successes, and pushed key environmental and business initiatives forward.

As the year unfolded, we not only maintained our leading position in optical networking but also asserted our strengths as a disruptor in new areas, such as Routing and Switching.

Let’s look back and revisit some of the top Ciena headlines that shaped the narrative of 2023:

Ciena once again sets the new standard in coherent optics with the introduction of WaveLogic 6, the industry's first 1.6Tb/s coherent optic solution

2023 kicked off with a bang with the introduction of WaveLogic 6, the newest generation of Ciena’s coherent optical technology. WaveLogic 6 provides massive 1.6Tb/s, single-carrier wavelengths for metro ROADM deployments, maximizes network coverage for 800G connectivity, and enables fit-for-purpose 800G pluggables to meet diverse customer and application requirements from 10 km to 1000 km. All of this adds up to more world firsts from Ciena.

With initial orders for WaveLogic 6 already in, 2024 will prove to be an exciting year.

Meet WaveRouter, a reimagined routing platform architecture for the converged metro

The innovation didn’t stop there. In April, we introduced the market to WaveRouter, a unique and purpose-built coherent metro router designed to converge IP and optical layers in the metro, but with never-before-seen flexibility, future-proof extensibility, and improved network sustainability.

Why a new metro router? Because our customers asked for a different way to build a converged metro network. And the response to WaveRouter has been nothing short of amazing – with the first customer already secured. We look forward to seeing the possibilities WaveRouter will create for metro architectures.

Disrupting the broadband market

Also this year, Ciena’s Joe Marsella discussed how we are at a pivotal moment in the residential broadband market due to the pandemic forcing new dynamics and accelerating other market shifts that were already underway, like the migration of residential/personal applications to the cloud.

The challenge? For years, broadband solutions served a narrow and straightforward focus of providing best-effort, asymmetrical services serving as many customers as possible in densely populated areas. But Joe explained that it was clear this new moment in time for residential broadband demands an entirely different solution – a disruptive network architecture.

So we met that challenge by providing our blueprint for a next-generation broadband architecture that provides an open, modular and scalable solution that is efficient and sustainable, best adapting to users' current and future application requirements while protecting existing network investments.

Fourth generation 100GbE becoming the real deal, paving the way for 25GS-PON and transforming Ciena’s Enterprise Edge Solutions

While many of the headlines you saw about Ciena’s products this year were for WaveLogic 6 and WaveRouter – there were several other product milestones. Here are three others to highlight:

This year, we introduced Ciena’s 8140 Coherent Metro Router, a dense 7.2Tbps switching platform in a compact 2RU footprint with 40 x 100G SFP-DD and 8 x 400G QSFP-DD ports. The 8140 provides flexibility in current deployments and for a seamless migration to dense 100GbE requirements, learn more in this blog.

Passive optical networks (PONs) have evolved significantly over the years to meet the escalating demand for bandwidth and performance. This transformation continues with 25 Gigabit Symmetric Passive Optical Network (25GS-PON). This year, we shared that Ciena platforms in service today are ready to support 25GS-PON by simply plugging in a 25GS-PON µOLT—with no loss in port density or impact to bandwidth. Network operators who have deployed or who are considering deploying Ciena’s Broadband Solution supported by our coherent aggregation routers can be confident as they deploy XGS-PON that their network is already prepared for 25GS-PON.

But that isn’t all, a lot has happened since we announced our agreement to acquire Vyatta technology, so Rafael Francis shared how Ciena has enhanced our Enterprise Edge solutions to help customers stay ahead of the shifting landscape to cloud-driven operations.

Ciena invests in U.S. manufacturing

We also announced that we are working with Flex to add new U.S.-based manufacturing capabilities for the industry’s first pluggable optical line terminals (OLTs) as well as our optical network units (ONU) in mid-2024. We are excited to support the U.S. government’s Broadband Equity Access and Deployment (BEAD) projects, create new jobs, and help broadband service providers comply with the Build America, Buy America (BABA) requirements.

For more resources about Ciena’s efforts to support BEAD-funded projects and to learn more about the procurement, architecture, construction, and monetization approach to a successful broadband network deployment, visit Ciena’s Broadband Insights hub.

Extending our environmental commitment with Science-Based Targets

This year it wasn’t only about how our products can help our customers’ sustainability goals – we also set our own near-term science-based greenhouse gas reduction targets (SBTs), approved by the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi). This further extended Ciena’s promise to reduce our environmental impact.

Our SBTs address our direct operations, as well as our innovative technology solutions, which can reduce the environmental impact of networks across the globe. The targets align with the Paris Climate Agreement to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

Blue Planet shares customer momentum success

We are here to help our customers accelerate their digital transformation journeys with our Blue Planet intelligent automation portfolio, so sharing how we are doing that is always a big announcement in our book. This year, our Blue Planet team got to share some key customer activities, like BT Group getting services live quicker for customers, Virgin Media Ireland automating delivery of next-gen fibre broadband services, Deutsche Telekom demonstrating multi-domain 5G dynamic slicing orchestration for enterprise services, and DISH Wireless expanding its first-of-its-kind cloud-native 5G Network with Blue Planet’s Automation Platform.

We are proud of the relationships and work that has driven our customers’ success in 2023 – and are excited to continue this momentum in 2024.

Another milestone: 100,000+ WaveLogic 5 800G shipments

In November, we reached an incredible milestone, surpassing 100,000 modems shipped of our industry-leading WaveLogic 5 Extreme (WL5e) programmable 800G technology, making it the market's most widely deployed 800G solution. Check out this video that explains the impact this has had on networks around the globe:

When you look back, it's exciting to see all the important innovations and initiatives Ciena accomplished in 2023. But you don’t think we are stopping there, right? Make sure you're one of the first to know what happens next by signing up for our newsletter.