Ciena is making moves to bolster its Blue Planet Intelligent Automation platform. The optical networking company today announced an agreement to acquire Centina. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.

The Texas-based company, which was founded in 2006, will become part of Ciena’s Blue Planet software portfolio. Blue Planet was formed in 2015 when Ciena acquired Cyan and spun off as an independent division earlier this year.

Centina’s services include assurance analytics and network performance management, two areas that Ciena intends to expand under its Blue Planet division. “Our Blue Planet portfolio also continues to evolve and mature, drawing increased customer engagement,” CEO Gary Smith said during the company’s most recent earnings call, according to a transcript.

“Our automation software portfolio continues to gain traction globally, and in fact, we remain on track to deliver on our fiscal year 2019 revenue target of between $50 million and $60 million,” Smith said almost a month before it announced the Centina acquisition. He also hinted at some potential areas of weakness or softening demand, warning analysts of “ebbs and flows” on a quarterly revenue basis but added that engagement is increasing around improved automation capabilities.

“It’s still a nascent space,” Smith said. “We’re learning. We’re putting together our portfolio, which I think is now in a pretty good place, so I would expect pretty good growth in that space over the next 18 months or so.” The Centina acquisition, which the company expects to close by the end of the year, underlines that strategy and outlook. The deal also comes as Ciena anticipates a wave of momentum and opportunities to grow its business as 5G deployments become more frequent and spread.

“The scale and speed associated with 5G networks requires greater levels of automation,” a Ciena spokesperson wrote in response to questions. “Service assurance is a critical element of a closed-loop automation process that enables operators to continuously monitor and optimize the performance of their networks on a proactive basis, reducing or eliminating manual operations.”

Centina will specifically enable Blue Planet to collect and collate fault, event, and performance data from vendors and multiple layers across the network, including NFV, optical, Ethernet, and MPLS. Ciena intends to integrate Centina’s services into Blue Planet’s Multi-Domain Service and Blue Planet Inventory to provide customers continuous insights into network service performance and the ability to resolve problems before they impact the network, according to the company.

In a prepared statement, Rick Hamilton, senior vice president of Blue Planet, described the move in terms of reinforcing the division’s position in operations support systems by focusing on closed-loop automation.

“By continuously monitoring the performance of services, Centina’s multi-layer, multi-domain service assurance solution will help our customers resolve issues more quickly and optimize network performance,” he said. “This is a key step to achieving more adaptive networks that are critical in today’s digital society where the customer experience is the ultimate differentiator.”

Centina’s customers include large nationwide operators like Verizon, Shaw Communications and Telesur; and smaller regional players like Conterra, Dakota Carrier Network, and Shentel.