Ciena Highlights High-Performance AI Networking at ECOC 2026

　　At ECOC 2026 taking place September 21-23 in Málaga, Spain, Ciena (NYSE: CIEN) will spotlight innovations for delivering AI data center performance at scale. Ciena’s booth (Hall 1, Booth #1045) will showcase solutions that simplify the delivery of high-speed, high-capacity connectivity services, including 1.6T coherent optics, multi-rail photonics, and high-performance electrical and optical interconnects for scale-up and scale-out applications.

　　Demonstrations

　　Intra-data center networking –Exploring how the Nitro 2004 linear redriver enables a new generation of copper interconnect. The demo also highlights how co-packaged optics (CPO), utilizing the Open CPX compliant Vesta 200 6.4T CPX optical engine, and liquid cooling accelerate the deployment of ultra-high density, power-optimized scale-up and scale-out data center networks.

　　Coherent optics –Demonstrating the next generation of coherent connectivity – from WaveLogic™ 6 Nano 800G pluggables to 1600ZR+ to liquid-cooled eXtra-dense Pluggable Optics (XPO) and full-spectrum transponders – providing the right performance, reach, density, and power for every inter-data center application.

　　Scale-across: high-density connectivity for AI infrastructure – Showcasing how Ciena combines its high-capacity coherent optics with RLS scale-across configurations, including RLS Hyper-Rail, to address the massive connectivity demands of distributed AI infrastructure. The demo highlights how RLS Hyper-Rail delivers a 32x density improvement, enabling more capacity in less space while simplifying deployment and improving power efficiency.

　　Scalable optical transport – Highlighting how Waveserver delivers flexible, high-capacity transport in a compact platform, from quantum-safe 1.6T encryption and integrated photonics to client aggregation and power-efficient 800G coherent pluggables.

　　Navigator Network Control Suite (NCS) – Showing how Navigator NCS enables operators to accelerate time-to-market, speed issue resolution, and reduce risk with AI-powered automation, troubleshooting, and digital-twin validation.

　　OIF (booth #2126) – Supporting OIF’s 800ZR, OpenROADM 800G, 400ZR, OpenZR+, and Multi-Span Optics and Common Management Interface Specification (CMIS) interoperability demos with Ciena’s WL6n C- and L-band 800G and WaveLogic 5 Nano (WL5n) 400G coherent pluggable transceivers. Ciena is also participating in the Common Electrical I/O demos, showing live 448Gb/s PAM4 and PAM6 multivendor interoperable transmission, helping drive the industry direction toward optimal rate adoption for 448G SerDes. Additionally, Ciena is contributing to a CPO demo showcasing the Vesta 200 6.4T CPX light engine as a key enabler of the overall ecosystem.

　　Speaking Sessions

　　Sunday, September 20

　　11:00 a.m. (Auditorium 2) – Bilal Riaz, Senior Director, Interconnects Product Line Management, will present during the “Breaking the Power Wall with Multi-Rail Photonics and Optical Interconnect Innovation” workshop

　　2:00 p.m. (Conference room 1.1) – Robert Keys, VP, Systems Architecture, will present during the “How Will We Manage the Heterogeneous Optical Communication Networks of the Future?” workshop

　　4:00 p.m. (Exhibition Room 1) – Robert Keys, VP, Systems Architecture, will present during the “Will the AI workload require an end-to-end-optimized network infrastructure?” workshop

　　4:00 p.m. (PV-R Multipurpose room) – Bilal Riaz, Senior Director, Interconnects Product Line Management, will present during the “Can fast narrow channels keep rising without limit or will slow and wide become the winner?” workshop

　　4:15 p.m. (Auditorium 1) – Kim Roberts, VP, WaveLogic Science, will present during the “Future role of coherent technology for data-center applications” workshop

　　Monday, September 21

　　10:00 a.m. (Auditorium 1) – Peter Winzer, VP, Systems Architecture, will speak at the “AI Cluster Communications” plenary session

　　10:40 a.m. (Market Focus Theatre) – Karen Liu, Interconnects Product Line Manager, will speak at the “Accelerating CPO Broad Market Adoption” Market Focus session

　　2:30 p.m. (Conference Room 2.2) – Marc Stephens, Senior Sales Engineer, will present during the “Algorithmically-Optimized Real-Time 18 Tb/s Throughput over a 16,608 km Trans-Pacific Subsea Link” session

　　4:00 p.m. (Market Focus Theatre) – Bilal Riaz, Senior Director, Interconnects Product Line Management, will participate in the “XPO and System Scaling” Market Focus panel

　　Wednesday, September 23

　　11:40 a.m. (Market Focus Theatre) – Frank Chang, Senior Director, Interconnects Product Line Management, will present “The Future of Coherent Optics in the AI Era” session

　　2:00 p.m. (Market Focus Theatre) – Andrew Kam, Senior Manager, Optical Engineering, will speak at the “Hollow-Core Fiber at Scale: Operational Insights from Multi-Span Transmission Systems” session

　　3:40 p.m. (Market Focus Theatre) – Helen Xenos, Senior Director, Portfolio Marketing, will speak at the “Beyond Connectivity: Real-World Network Sensing with Existing Optical Infrastructure” session