Addressing the bandwidth strain that the ever-increasing volume of video is putting on core networks, Alcatel-Lucent said it has developed a roadmap for converging its IP and its optical backbone networking products.

Alcatel-Lucent's new Converged Backbone Transformation solution will introduce intelligent control plane integration between the optical and IP layers. That measure alone is expected to yield benefits such as rapid service provisioning and increased resiliency, the company said.

Meanwhile, both optical and IP portfolios are evolving to support 40 Gigabit and 100 Gigabit speeds in the data plane.

The company said it is also delivering an integrated network management approach that will enable network operators to get visibility across both IP and optical domains.

A-L will also give network operators “grooming” options to increase transport network efficiency by enabling traffic forwarding at the most economical layer in the network. These include, the company said, lambda (or wavelength)-level, port-level and sub-port-level grooming of IP traffic to enable capacity increases in increments where and when needed and enable core router traffic to be offloaded onto the optical transport network.