Designing Routed Optical Networks: IP/MPLS Considerations - BRKSPG-2029#
Cisco Live Europe 2025 (Amsterdam) digest Program Core pick Amsterdam · 9–14 February 2025
Speakers: Emerson Moura (Cisco)
- Why: Routed Optical Networking (RON) — collapsing IP and DWDM into one managed layer — is a genuine architectural shift in WAN/DCI economics, and this is the IP-routing-layer half of the story, which is where the interesting design questions live.
- What: How the IP routing layer of a RON architecture works: how a simpler, IP-centric multi-service design reduces operator cost, improves asset utilization and resiliency, and enables network optimization for distributed applications, content, and peering. Includes a traditional IP/DWDM vs. RON comparison. (from abstract only)
- How: Rather than managing a separate optical layer with its own control plane, RON exposes optical capacity to the IP layer (coherent pluggables in routers), so routing decisions account for optical reach and spectrum directly — simplifying the architecture and letting the IGP/BGP layer drive end-to-end path selection.
- Where applicable: Service-provider and large DCI WANs primarily; requires coherent-pluggable-capable routers and a greenfield-ish willingness to restructure transport operations. Less applicable to enterprise campuses or small DC footprints.