Telus buys faster network technology from Nortel

Telus Corp, Canada's No. 2 phone company, said on Wednesday it is buying new technology from Nortel Networks Corp that lets telecom companies quadruple the capacity of their networks.

Telus's deployment of 40G optical technology from Nortel, North America's biggest maker of telephone equipment, comes after rival Canadian telecom group BCE Inc announced in September that it would be using it.

Financial terms weren't disclosed.

The Nortel technology delivers speeds of 40 gigabits per second (Gbps) — about four times faster than today's high-end networking speeds — over fiber-optic cables thinner than a human hair.

Current high-end network speeds of 10 Gbps can support the bandwidth of 1,000 high-definition television channels simultaneously.

Telecom companies are looking for ways to quickly and cheaply bulk up their networks as demand for bandwidth explodes, driven by the popularity of online video, music and gaming.