The evolution of the telecommunications transport architecture : from megabit / s to terabit

For many years, the evolution of telecommunication networks and the enabling technologies followed an almost prescriptive mechanism, based on a hierarchical arrangement of local, regional and national/international voice switching telephone exchanges. Growth in traffic was fairly predictable, determined mainly by the rate of telephone take-up, with a smattering of higher speed (n × 64 kbit/s and 2 Mbit/s) leased-line data traffic for larger business applications. This steady-state growth received an unprecedented and disruptive change during the 1990s, as business and, later, residential services became data orientated, fuelled latterly by the rapid growth in Internet traffic. In the same period, the traditional telecommunication network providers were simultaneously faced with the widespread liberalisation of their traditional monopoly positions and the consequent appearance of new operators. These latter, as well as offering a range of conventional The evolution of the telecommunications transport architecture: from megabit/s to terabit/s