Representative case
Pre-terminated cabling and optics for a 200-rack data hall in Southeast Asia
A colocation operator opened its second data hall on the planned date, with cabling made to its rack drawings, labelled for the installer and tested piece by piece.
- Racks
- 200
- Assemblies
- ≈ 7,800 trunks, cassettes, cords
- Transceivers
- ≈ 1,400, 25G–400G
- Order to delivery
- 5–6 weeks
The starting point
Where they started
- Customer
- A colocation operator building its second data hall, with a local contractor installing the cabling.
- Where
- Southeast Asia
- Before
- Rack elevation drawings, a spine-and-leaf design with 400G uplinks, and a hall-ready date nine weeks away.
Requirements
What they needed
- 400G DR4 uplinks over single-mode MPO-12 APC trunks; 100G SR4 and 25G server links over OM4
- Low-loss MPO connectors, ≤ 0.35 dB per mated pair
- Polarity method B throughout, matched to the cassettes
- Labels by row, rack and port in the operator’s own scheme
- Transceivers coded for the operator’s switches and tested in them
What we supplied
Equipment, by stage
-
Connect
Backbone
- ≈ 640 MPO-12 trunks, OS2 and OM4, cut to length from the rack elevations
- 1U and 4U panels with MPO-LC cassettes
- Polarity method B end to end
-
Connect
Patching
- ≈ 6,800 LC duplex and MPO patch cords
- Colour-coded by service and labelled at both ends
-
Connect
Optics
- ≈ 1,400 transceivers: 400G DR4, 100G SR4 and 25G SR
- Coded for the operator’s switch platform
- 2 % spares kept on site
Acceptance
How it was proven
- Insertion loss measured for every assembly, with the result on a QR label
- End-face images for every MPO connector
- Every transceiver tested in the target switch model before packing
- Installer’s site test of every trunk with an optical loss test set
Results
What it achieved
- Racks
- 200
- Delivered
- 2 lots, 5 and 6 weeks after order
- Trunks passing the site test
- 100 %
- Transceivers dead on arrival
- 3 of ≈ 1,400 (0.2 %), replaced from spares the same day
- Hall ready
- On the planned date
Schedule
From contract to running
- 01
Design check
Polarity, trunk lengths and labels checked against the rack elevations and the installer’s drawings.
Week 1
- 02
Make and test
Trunks, cassettes and cords made to length and tested; transceivers coded and tested in the switch.
Weeks 2–5
- 03
Ship by row
Packed by row and rack: lot 1 by air, lot 2 by sea.
Weeks 5–6
- 04
Install and test
The installer pulls and tests rack by rack; spares cover the three failed transceivers.
Weeks 7–9
Who did what
One contract, several factories
ZeroLine
- Found a polarity mismatch between the installer’s drawings and the cassette type before anything was made
- Worked out every trunk length from the rack elevations, with slack to the operator’s rule
- One contract for cabling from two factories and optics from one module maker
- Packed and labelled by row, so the installer could work rack by rack
The factories
- Two Optics Valley factories made the trunks, cassettes and cords
- A module maker in Wuhan coded and tested the transceivers
Settle polarity on paper. Changing cassettes after the trunks are made costs weeks; changing a drawing costs an hour.
Behind this project
The solution and services it used
- Data centers Fiber cabling, transceivers and backup power, matched to your design.
- Sourcing and factory audit The right factory for your job, audited on site and compared like for like.
- Factory acceptance and inspection Nothing ships before it has run. You watch the test, then you pay.
- Shipping and compliance Export documents, crating, one consolidated shipment, and the papers your market needs.
More cases
Other projects, end to end
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- FTTH materials for 30,000 homes in East Africa, in four lots An ISP moving from fixed wireless to fiber bought every passive item for two cities from one supplier, lot by lot to its rollout plan, at prices fixed for three lots.
- Pulsed laser cleaning for tyre moulds in South Asia A tyre plant moved mould cleaning from off-line dry-ice blasting to laser cleaning in the press, and cut press downtime per mould from about 4.5 hours to 1.5.
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