Warley Design Partners With Xtera Communications To Develop New Optical Repeater For Subsea Cable Systems
Warley Design Solutions, one of the UK’s leading independent providers of Mechanical Design & Engineering Services, has helped Xtera Communications Inc, a leading global supplier of optical networking solutions, to develop and launch a next-generation optical repeater for subsea cable systems. The new repeater enables service providers to build high performance and highly reliable submarine cable solutions, for short regional systems and very long transoceanic applications, with significantly improved reach and capacity.
According to Stuart Barnes, Chief Technology Officer at Xtera Communications: “Warley Design Solutions was the perfect partner to complement our in-house resources, with the required technical capabilities, background and experience to assist in the development of this new optical repeater that will significantly increase the reliability and service quality of subsea fibre optic cabling systems.”
As part of the Xtera team, Warley Design Solutions played a key role in designing what is now probably the world’s smallest, lightest and most technically advanced optical repeater, including mechanical elements of the highly sophisticated internal opto-electronics and the external housing that enables it to be deployed in extremely hostile environments. The company provided the expertise to help overcome the many design and engineering challenges to ensure that the repeater could withstand immense pressures, enabling it to operate reliably within its design specification, throughout its expected 25 year service life, in water depths of up to 8km.
“Warley Design is a valued collaboration partner that has demonstrated its ability to find new and innovative solutions to address the many technical challenges associated with this type of equipment,” continued Stuart Barnes. “We have benefitted from their proactive and flexible approach throughout this project and they have gelled really well with our internal resources to form a single, united team working together to achieve the overall objective.”
“We have provided specialised design and engineering services to Xtera from the very start of this important project, from early concepts through to release and production,” added Warley Design Solutions. “This optical repeater development programme has enabled us to demonstrate our capacity for innovation and agile approach when working in partnership with a like-minded client. Our contribution to the conceptual design of this new generation of reliable optical repeaters has been acknowledged by the listing of our staff as co-inventors on one of Xtera’s patent applications.”