OECC/PSC 2019

Organizers: Werner Klaus (NICT, Japan), Jing Li (Yangtze Optical Fibre and Cable Joint Stock Limited Company, China), Peter Pondillo (Corning Incorporated, USA), Takehiro Tsuritani (KDDI Research, Inc. Japan)

Space division multiplexing (SDM) in the form of multi-core fibers (MCF) is a potential technology for future optical transmission systems and has been subject of intensive research over the last decade. MCF has successively demonstrated transmission speeds in excess of Petabit/s, however, with regard to actual deployment, there still remain a number of unanswered questions and unsolved problems, both from a technical and commercial point of view. This workshop is an excellent opportunity for industry’s experts to address these open questions, which could eventually pave the way towards standardization and commercialization of MCF-based solutions.
The focus of this workshop is to investigate the practical elements associated with an end-to-end MCF ecosystem. More specifically, the workshop will explore the problem statements that MCF technology is better suited to address relative to single-core fiber technology, applications spaces where MCF is more likely to occur first, MCF designs that are most pragmatic, MCF fiber/connectivity performance requirements, achievable cost-per-bit of MCF-based solutions relative to its single-core fiber counterparts, and factors that will either hinder or accelerate MCF technology adoption. We would also encourage the authors to explore on whether alternative techniques (such as, few-mode fibers) could make MCF unattractive.