Optical Internetworking Forum

On April 20, 1998 Cisco Systems and Ciena Corporation announced an industry-wide initiative to create the Optical Internetworking Forum (OIF), an open forum focused on accelerating the development and deployment of interoperable networking solutions and services through the creation of Implementation Agreements (IAs) for optical networking products, network processing elements, and component technologies. Implementation agreements will be based on requirements developed cooperatively by end-users, service providers, equipment vendors and technology providers, and aligned with worldwide standards, augmented if necessary.