Indonesian telco XL Axiata and Chinese gear maker Huawei have announced the building of a next generation all-optical network in the country, which the former notes is designed to support its ongoing expansion in homes and businesses across Indonesia ahead of the 5G era. A leading mobile network operator (MNO), XL Axiata’s network provides data, voice, SMS and other value added services (VAS) for all end user segments and as part of its commitment to become ‘the most popular data communication provider’ in Indonesia, it has proposed its new 3R (Revamp, Rise & Reinvent) Strategy ‘to provide rich content services for users and bring digital services to every Indonesian family and enterprise by building a new business model with data services as the core’. The move to a unified planning and construction of the entire transport network and building an all-optical network to enhance its leading position in the 5G era, forms the core of 3R.
Commenting on the agreement, Yessie Dianty Yosetya, CTO of XL Axiata, said: ‘We are reconstructing the transport network to provide Fixed Mobile Convergence [FMC] businesses. Huawei’s solution supports the construction of a high-bandwidth, low-latency and simplified transport network, which effectively matches our strategic goal for network simplification. We are confident that this solution will provide optimal network experience for all customers across Indonesia and help them better enjoy digital life.’ It is understood that XL Axiata has adopted the Chinese firm’s Optical Networking 2.0 solution to simplify network architecture oriented to FMC and 5G-based services. Huawei’s solution uses an OXC (all-optical cross-connect) device – claiming an industry first – to build a 3D-mesh backbone network and enable one-hop connection between sites to implement fast end-to-end service provisioning. Further, Optical Networking 2.0 promotes the extension of optical networks to end nodes on the network and the building out of a 5G Ready metro network.