Viettel has bolstered its 5G expansion plans with Ciena as the Vietnamese telecom giant touts its network services to hyperscaler firms.

Using Ciena’s optical technology suite, Viettel reported its core network is able to transmit data at a high speed of 600 Gb/s across distances greater than 1,000 km, with a six-fold increase in capacity from 4 Tb/s to 25.2 Tb/s. Specifically, Ciena’s 6500 Packet-Optical Platform was used in the deployment, which leverages Ciena’s WaveLogic 5 Extreme (WL5e) 800G coherent optics.

The Hanoi-headquartered firm is also planning toward a 6G infrastructure, reporting a 1.6 Tb/s trial over a single fiber-optic channel on one of its network links using Ciena’s WaveLogic 6 Extreme (WL6e). Viettel joins Verizon in this endeavor, with the American giant having used WL6e last year to transfer 1.6 Tb/s of data across its live fiber network.

Viettel said the WL6e trial saw the doubling of its existing fiber wavelength capacity from 800Gb/s to 1.6Tb/s, giving it the potential to offer ultra-high-speed 800GbE connectivity services.

The firm said it is anticipating a surge in local and international traffic due to the rise in cloud and AI application use, with Ciena chosen for its expertise in Layer 0 control plane technology, representing the optical layer, along with the provision of its automated management suite.

"Optical backbones are critical to providing the connectivity needed to continue Vietnam’s reputation as a fast-growing digital economy in Southeast Asia,” said Wendy Le, country lead, Vietnam, Ciena.

“Together with Viettel, Ciena is helping build the connectivity foundation essential to help Vietnam maintain its pace of growth in the AI era, all while optimizing carbon footprint, power, and capacity.”

Viettel's expansion comes as vendors worldwide are preparing AI training and inference demands, with a recent report by Dell’Oro Group finding AI led to a 51% increase in global data center capex in 2024, hitting $455 billion in investment.

650 Group has argued this AI demand will push Ethernet, fueled by growing adoption of 800 Gb/s (800G) and eventually 1.6 Tb/s (1.6T) system capacity, past InfiniBand as “the dominant technology for scale-out” by the end of this year, generating more than $8 billion in revenues.

Ciena’s coherent technology was deployed last week by Comcast across the U.S., in a partnership designed to help broaden fiber connectivity in underserved areas.

The firm also recently introduced new compact optical transport platforms aimed at supporting edge networking and metro access networks, the Waveserver E10 and Waveserver E200, with both models designed to offer scalable and flexible transport capabilities in a small form factor.