Tweets from Metro-Haul
- Path Computation Element is a significant technology component for #orchestration of agile #optical #networks, & tr… https://t.co/q84VYNjE5f 6 months ago
- #MetroHaul wins #ONDM2020 Best Paper award - "The Role of Metro Transport Node Architectures in Optimized Edge Data… https://t.co/zMYFdAV9KM 6 months ago
- Our latest blog has just been published - "From Earth to Space: how optical technologies will play a significant ro… https://t.co/DQ2cfAFyAR 8 months ago
Metro-Haul
Project Overview
The aim of this project is to design and build a smart optical metro infrastructure able to support traffic originating from heterogeneous 5G access networks, addressing the anticipated capacity increase and its specific characteristics, e.g., mobility, low latency, low jitter etc. This infrastructure will also support a wide variety of services and use cases with special emphasis on services from various industries vertical to the ICT.
This will be achieved by architecting new access-facing and core-facing nodes, complete with storage and compute facilities, interconnected by novel, spectrally efficient, and adaptive optical transmission networks. Advanced concepts, such as hardware disaggregation and virtualisation, will assist in hitting challenging cost targets whilst enabling automation and programmability – all supported by a purpose-designed SDN-based control plane which will interface with client applications, intelligently catering for the wide range of 5G KPIs.
METRO-HAUL will coordinate the disparate elements of transmission, switching, networking, compute, and storage, orchestrating dynamic solutions for multiple 5G applications.
METRO-HAUL will carry out Proof of Concept demonstrations of its networking solution involving the interconnection of metro node prototypes, the use of the project’s transmission technologies, and the associated control plane and orchestration software. The final project demonstrations will also involve the demonstration of actual 5G and vertical services across the METRO-HAUL test-bed.
Additionally, the project will actively participate in the relevant standardization bodies, promoting METRO-HAUL solutions to the wider community.
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The 24th International Conference on Optical Network Design and Modelling (ONDM) Conference and Metro-Haul Best Paper Award
Technical conferences are becoming increasingly virtual since the outbreak of Covid-19, and last week the 24th International Conference on Optical Network Design and Modelling (ONDM) transitioned to become a remote participation event. ONDM has a history in presenting ideas on recent trends such as 5G and beyond; data-center networking; Internet of things; cloud/edge computing and […]
From Earth to Space: how optical technologies will play a significant role in future Internet
Exponential increases in Internet speed have facilitated an entirely new set of applications and industry verticals underpinned by evolving fixed optical networks, and projects such as Metro-Haul. As we pioneered optical communication and control for next generation 5G Internet and services, we must now look for emerging challenges ahead. We may look up both figuratively […]
Metro-Haul Releases a discussion document for “Optics Research for Future Smart Networks and Services”
Infrastructure projects on a national or international scale are a rare occurrence, due to their size, cost and complexity. Historical undertakings such as the construction of a comprehensive rail network, the telegraph network, sewage systems, the electrical grid and water supplies are just a few examples of the many large-scale projects that have been completed […]
The advances of Metro-Haul confirms that: “Skynet” is unavoidable.
“Terminator” is a Hollywood blockbuster movie sequel starring Arnold Schwarzenegger that was launched back in 1984 and currently the latest saga is on screens. The movie plot is around a fictitious Artificial Intelligence (AI) entity -the Skynet- which is so advanced that becomes self-aware, it is spread through the Internet and when people are trying […]
The Metro-Haul 2nd Year Annual Review – A personal perspective from the overall project manager, Andrew Lord
It’s a respectable 10am and my trusty Technical Manager for Metro-Haul (Albert) arrives on my drive, and we duly set off to catch the Eurostar from Ebbsfleet on our journey to Brussels to lead the end of 2nd year project review. The rest of the day, whilst driving, train-ing, dining in Brussels but mainly sitting […]
Dark Matters about Metro-Haul
One of the delightful aspects about European research in H2020 is the chance to interact and work with a fantastic set of engineers, scientists, and technologists on interesting and highly worthwhile projects. In justifying the work we do in these research projects, however, there is still always the need to report on the positive impact […]
Evolving VPN-based Services: A Framework for Enhanced VPNs
Virtual Private Networks (VPNs) have become one of the most sold network services offered by Internet Service Providers (ISPs). They provide connectivity between remote customer sites; the technology allows computers within the customer’s network to communicate as though they were all attached to the same local physical network. That is, the VPN service builds a […]
IETF ACTN: From Standards to Deployment Light Reading Video Interview
Metro-Haul WP6 Leader Adrian Farrel was recently interviewed by Light Reading at during Metro-Hauls workshop at NGON and DCI World 2019 in Nice, and part of NGON’s Optical Masterclass Series. You can watch the full video here.
IETF Tools for Management and Operation of Flexible Optical Metro Networks in Support of 5G
We have just held a successful pre-conference workshop at NGON and DCI World 2019 in Nice as part of NGON’s Optical Masterclass Series. The title of the workshop was “Evolving Approaches to the Control of 5G Support Networks Using IETF Technologies”, and it featured speakers from network operators, equipment vendors, researchers, and implementers from across […]
Speakers announced and agenda published for Metro-Haul Pre-Conference Workshop at NGON 2019
As we complete the planning for Metro-Haul’s pre-conference workshop to be held at NGON and DCI World, it is about time to give you an update. NGON and DCI World takes place at the Acropolis in Nice from 21st to 23rd May. The workshop is called “Evolving Approaches to the Control of 5G Support Networks […]
Metro-Haul Pre-Conference Workshop at NGON 2019
by Adrian Farrel NGON and DCI World has become a regular event in the calendar for people working in optical networking. The 2019 conference will be held from May 21st to 23rd in Acropolis, Nice, France. At last year’s event, the keynote address was delivered by Andrew Lord of BT and project lead for Metro-Haul. […]
Safe Cities – A Metro-Haul Use Case
by Stephan Rasp The Metro-Haul project depends heavily on a number of use cases to establish realistic requirements to underpin the research and drive the development or architecture, software, and hardware. One of those use cases concerns the collection and coordination of data streams from a large numbr of video cameras. Over the last decade […]
5GPPP Coordination – A Personal View by Adrian Farrel
On the 20th and 21st of this month, Albert Rafel and I attended a 5GPPP workshop in Kista, Stockholm to coordinate the approach to 5G KPIs across a number of EU-funded research projects. The meeting, convened by Didier Bourse and Anastasius (Tasos) Gavras, had as its stated aim “Boosting the definition of the 5GPPP Performance […]
Standardization of 100-Gbit/s Coherent Interfaces by ITU-T SG15
By Michael Eiselt, ADVA Optical Networking Disaggregated optical networks require a careful specification of the interfaces between the network segments. In particular, the coherent transmission systems must be well specified to distribute the responsibility for network performance between all segments of the transmission link, namely the transmitter (TX), the optical path, and the receiver (RX). […]
Metro-Haul’ers Win Best Student Paper Award at CNSM 2018
Well done to Daniel Perdices and his co-authors: David Muelas, Luis de Pedro, Jorge E. L´opez de Vergara; for their award-winning paper “Network Performance Monitoring with Flexible Models of Multi-Point Passive Measurements”. This paper was published the 14th International Conference on Network and Service Management 2018 – http://cnsm-conf.org/2018/. Their award-winning paper highlights the many concurrent […]
Packet-level network measurements in METRO-HAUL
One of the main challenges of the METRO-HAUL project is to implement tools to monitor future 5G metro networks. Such data can be obtained by telemetry from the different network elements, such as optical transponders or SDN controllers. Moreover, packet-level measurements can also be taken from network probes, to contrast their results with optical-layer measurements, […]
Demos, Hackathons, Dissemination, and Cooperation in Paris
Metro-Haul just held its fourth plenary (month 16), hosted by Nokia in Paris-Saclay. It was a busy meeting focusing on discussions and plans, not just status and reporting. Didier Bourse from Nokia Incubator dropped in to address the meeting. Didier chairs the Technical Board of the EC’s 5G-PPP and has the unenviable task of trying […]
Metro-Haul presence at ECOC 2018
The European Conference on Optical Communication (ECOC) is one of the biggest industry conferences in Europe. Since the Metro-Haul project launch in 2017, this is the second opportunity for Metro-Haul to present its research outcomes in ECOC. Last year, during ECOC 2017, despite just three months after the project launch, the Metro-Haul project had nine […]
Demonstrating What Metro-Haul has Achieved So Far
By Roberto Morro, Telecom Italia The 44th European Conference on Optical Communication (ECOC) will take place in Rome, Italy from the 23rd to 27th September [1]. The Metro-Haul project will be well represented with talks and presentations in lots of the sessions. The ECOC programme also includes space for demonstrations of recent developments in software […]
Metro-Haul/Net2Plan Hackathon Report
By Miquel Garrich Alabarce, UPC Net2Plan [1] is a free and open-source Java tool initiated in 2011, devoted to planning, optimization, and evaluation of communication networks, with the following major characteristics: Multilayer technology-agnostic network representation that permits adaptation of Net2Plan to multiple network technologies (e.g., WDM, IP, IP over WDM, wireless ad-hoc, and wireless cellular). […]
Metro-Haul is Innovating
by Antonio D’Errico, Work Package 6 Innovation Lead Innovation is an essential outcome of any Horizon 20-20 project. While research, dissemination, and standardisation have high value, the best results for the project partners and for the EU as a whole arise from the development of products, services, and sales activities that boost the long-term […]
What is ACTN?
The Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) has just published a “Framework for Abstraction and Control of TE Networks (ACTN)” as RFC 8453 [1]. This is an important milestone for the Metro-Haul project because ACTN is a key concept in the management architecture that we are considering. The document received text contributions from two Metro-Haul participants, […]
Network Slicing at the IETF
Network slicing remains a key concept in the development of new network technologies and the planning of new network services especially in support of 5G. Figure 1 Network slicing by example – Source Nokia As the foremost standards-making body for the Internet, it is natural that the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) should spend time […]
It’s Hot in Bucharest – But Metro-Haul is Hotter
The International Conference on Transparent Optical Networks (ICTON) has reached its 20th year, which is quite something in this rapidly moving industry. For the four day meeting in Bucharest, ICTON 2018 focused on the applications of transparent and all-optical technologies in telecommunications, computing, and novel applications. It included special sessions and tracks covering a wide […]
Metro-Haul impact at OFC 2018
The Metro-Haul project is poised to make a big splash at this year’s OFC 2018. With 23 contributions accepted, including invited talks, workshops and tutorials, the consortium members are making significant contributions to the industry. Andrew Lord from BT, Metro-Haul’s project leader, stated; “to have so many contributions accepted in OFC 2018, including multiple invitations […]
Metro-Haul Presence in ECOC 2017
Metro-Haul has had a notable presence in the last European Conference on Optical Communications (ECOC), which took place in Gothenburg, Sweden, on September 17-21, 2017. Main results and achievements from the first months of the project have been disseminated by Metro-Haul partners, covering both data and control plane aspects. Metro-Haul key objectives include performing research […]
2nd Plenary Meeting Hosted by CTTC in Castelldefels, Catalonia
5 months after the project launch, Metro-Haul project had its second plenary meeting on 7th – 9th November, which was kindly hosted by CTTC in Castelledefels, Spain. With 48 attendees from across 7 European countries, the plenary successfully ended with fruitful discussions over various topics. For the summary of the plenary meeting, please refer the […]
To Slice or Not to Slice, That is the Question
– A personal view from Adrian Farrel One of the questions exercising the partners in the Metro-Haul project is “What is a network slice?” There are several base definitions that can be drawn upon, although many of these are specific to particular layers in the network, to the technologies in use, and to the services being […]
The Metro-Haul Project in Overview
The €7.7 million Metro-Haul project, funded by the European Commission has a total of 20 partners from 7 European countries. Recent estimates suggest that by the year 2025 over 1.4 billion users will be using 5G mobile connections to access high bandwidth services such as 4K video streaming, enhanced reality, and massive multi-player mobile gaming. […]
Metro-Haul Project Launched
The Metro-Haul project is funded and live! Our consortium has been awarded €7.7 million by the European Commission to fund ambitious research into the application of scalable optical networks to future 5G wireless technology and services. The consortium is made up of twenty members and includes major network operators, equipment manufacturers, specialist small businesses, and […]
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“Exceptionally Successful” Metro-Haul Project in Support of 5G Services
“Exceptionally Successful” Metro-Haul Project Plans Final Deliverables and Showcase Demonstrations to Illustrate the Value of SDN Control of Flexible Metro Networks in Support of 5G Services Pisa Meeting of EU-Funded Project Hosted by Ericsson Telecomunicazioni and CNIT Pisa, Italy, 31 October 2019 – 28 months into its 3-year run, representatives of the 21 partner organisations […]
Metro-Haul Reaches Japan
METRO-HAUL’s impact continues to spread. A recent press release from NTT reports on “NTT and Telefónica start PoC on Open Optical and Packet Transport technologies within Telecom Infra Project.” Nippon Telegraph and Telephone Corporation (NTT; Headquartered in Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Japan; President and CEO: Jun Sawada) and Telefónica announced that they have conducted a successful PoC […]
Metro-Haul Year 2 Newsletter – A Year in Blogs
As we near the end of the calendar year, we thought we would publish a special newsletter which showcases a number of blogs we published earlier in the year. The bulk of the newsletter is made up of edited highlights from some of our blog posts below: Packet-Level Network Measurements in METRO-HAUL by Jorge Lopez […]
IETF ACTN: From Standards to Deployment Light Reading Video Interview
Metro-Haul WP6 Leader Adrian Farrel was recently interviewed by Light Reading at during Metro-Hauls workshop at NGON and DCI World 2019 in Nice, and part of NGON’s Optical Masterclass Series. You can watch the full video here.
Metro-Haul Project Refines the Details of Its Demonstrations that Will Demonstrate the Value of SDN Control of Flexible Metro Networks in Support of 5G Services
APril 8th, 2019 – Fifth Plenary Meeting of EU-Funded Project Hosted by Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya in Barcelona Barcelona, Catalonia, Spain, 8 April 2019 – At the end of the sixth quarter of the three-year project, the Metro-Haul consortium representing 21 separate companies and academic institutions, met to take stock and plan how to convert […]
Metro-Haul Pre-Conference Workshop at NGON 2019
by Adrian Farrel NGON and DCI World has become a regular event in the calendar for people working in optical networking. The 2019 conference will be held from May 21st to 23rd in Acropolis, Nice, France. At last year’s event, the keynote address was delivered by Andrew Lord of BT and project lead for Metro-Haul. […]
Metro-Haul Year 2 Newsletter
Into our second year and things are heating up in Metro-Haul! This year is a “Time to Test”, with numerous hardware and software implementations on going, we are publishing initial findings, proof-of-concepts and project dissemination impact. The newsletter contains; Key Metro-Haul Smart City Use Case Proof of Concept example using Open Source platforms Winner, Winner, […]
Metro-Haul lights the way to 5G optical networking at ECOC 2018
ECOC 2018 (www.ecoc2018.org) 23-27 September 2018 (Rome, Italy). The EU-funded Metro-Haul project (metro-haul.eu) is again making waves, in every sense, at ECOC 2018 – the leading European conference on optical communication. After hugely successful participation at OFC 2018 (see our blog: “Metro-Haul Impact at OFC 2018”, the Metro-Haul team is furthering its research and industry […]
Metro-Haul Year 1 Newsletter
It has been just over 1 year since the project has been kicked off in June 2017. Here, we proudly present our first newsletter after the fruitful first year. The newsletter contains; Technology Trends and Market Outlook Project Dissemination Through Social Networking Year 1 Golden Nuggets .. and more! The METRO-HAUL project is therefore proposing […]
Metro-Haul Holds Successful Plenary Session Addressing Implications of 5G Use Cases in Metro Optical Networks
9th May, 2018 Third Plenary Meeting of EU-Funded Project, Hosted in Lisbon by Coriant, Advances Technology Research and Collaboration in the Area of 5G-Optimized Metro Networks LISBON, Portugal, 9 May 2018 – The Metro-Haul Project, a Horizon 2020 European Union research and innovation program, today announced the successful completion of its third plenary meeting. More […]
Metro-Haul makes a big impact at OFC 2018
OFC 2018 (https://www.ofcconference.org/en-us/home/) in San Diego is the first major conference seeing significant Metro-Haul dissemination. The project began in June 2017, and we are already seeing a wide range of work emerging from all parts of this large European funded project. Metro-Haul partners are deeply involved in this conference, exerting plenty of influence on the […]
Bringing Flexibility to the Optical Metro Network in Support of 5G : Successful Metro-Haul Plenary Meeting Hosted by CTTC in Castelldefels
November, 2017 The Metro-Haul project is an EU funded project that has been awarded €7.7 million to fund ambitious research into the application of scalable optical networks to future 5G wireless technology and services. The objective of the project is to architect and design cost-effective, energy-efficient, agile, and programmable metro networks that are scalable for […]
Ambitious Multi-National 5G Optical Network Project Awarded €7.7m in EU Funding
A consortium of European companies and research institutions has been awarded €7.7 million by the European Commission to fund ambitious research into the application of scalable optical networks to future 5G wireless technology and services. The objective of the Metro-Haul project is to architect and design cost-effective, energy-efficient, agile, and programmable metro networks that are […]
