AT&T announced Monday that it had expanded the reach of its 40G IP/MPLS backbone network to more than 50,000 miles in the United States.

The company says that the upgraded backbone will let customers receive online video, photos, music and IP-based business applications across longer distances four times quicker that the current backbone. The newly upgraded network backbone includes 18,000 miles of optical ultralong haul routes that the company says will eventually be used to carry voice and data traffic at speeds up to 100Gbps.

The company estimates that 40% of IP traffic carried over its backbone will travel through its upgraded 40Gbps platform by year-end, and that it will be able to connect IP/MPLS network hubs in 25 major metropolitan areas within months. The backbone will be used for a wide array of services, says AT&T, including business services such as video, data and voice, as well as consumer services such as AT&T DSL and U-verse.

“As the demand for Internet and IP-based applications continues to explode, IP traffic on the AT&T network has doubled throughout the past two years,” says John Stankey, group president of Telecom Operations at AT&T. “We fully expect this substantial growth to continue in the future.”

The Cisco Carrier Routing System (CRS-1), will extend 40Gbps from a core network to regional carrier locations, and will serve as the core platform for AT&T’s backbone expansion, the company says. The CRS-1, which Cisco unveiled in June 2004, has 1.2Tbps of capacity and 40Gbps of capacity per line card slot. Yahoo! Broadband in Japan deployed the CRS-1 to upgrade its network to 40Gbps last year to meet customer demand for Internet access, VoIP and video-on-demand.

AT&T first announced that it was upgrading its global MPLS backbone to 40Gbps OC-768 speeds in June 2006. The company first conducted first field tests of 40G technology more than three years ago, and has recently been conducting field tests of 100G technology. Verizon has also been experimenting with 100G technology, and the company transmitted a live video feed for more than 312 miles from Tampa to Miami over its 100Gbps optical network last month.