MEF Touts Benefits Of Carrier Ethernet 2.0

The Metro Ethernet Forum (MEF) has announced a new version of its Carrier Ethernet specification, calling it a “new generation” of Ethernet.

Carrier Ethernet is designed to make interfaces to telecoms networks easier for those familiar with Ethernet, the network protocol that drove all before it on local area network cables. Version 2 of the MEF’s specification (CE 2.0)  improves Ethernet service interconnect between various carriers.

CE 2.0 Features

“According to IDC over 1.2 billion new Ethernet ports shipped last year (400m wired, 800m Wi-Fi). Build it and they will come still holds true,” said Bob Metcalfe, the man who invented Ethernet back in 1973 at Xerox PARC.

Metcalfe is now a MEF Advisory Director, as well as a professor of innovation at the University of Texas.

There is no new protocol in CE 2.0 but, according to MEF’s president and founder Nan Chen, it took over a year of preparation and hard work.

“We at MEF are so excited by CE 2.0 which is generational more advanced and in a position to really change the industry again,” said Chen.

According to Chen, the major difference between CE 1.0 and CE 2.0 is that “CE 1.0 was only able to provide standardised Ethernet Services (E-Line and E-Lan) to be delivered over a single provider’s network.”

“However second generation CE 2.0 can best be defined by its ability to deliver differentiated applications over interconnected managed networks globally,” said Chen.

CE 2.0 is apparently backwards compatible with CE 1.0 and expands the number of identified Ethernet services to eight. These eight services come in four types – E-Line, E-LAN, E-Tree and E-Access.

“The specification was agreed in January and can now be confidentially deployed as a new industry standard, said Chen.

More information on CE 2.0 is available in this YouTube video, as MEF had not released any other supporting materials to the press at the time of writing.

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