PWE3 Carrying Enterprise Leased Line Services on a MAN

Usage Scenario

Figure 1 shows a typical single-segment PWE3 networking. A carrier establishes a MAN to provide PWE3 services. A customer has two branches far from each other. If the customer use leased lines to connect the branches, it will result in high costs. The customer can request the carrier to establish a PWE3 connection between PE1 in branch A and PE2 in branch B.

PWE3 ensures stable Layer 2 communication between branches A and B, facilitates networking, and allows branches A and B to communicate with each other like on a LAN.

Figure 1 PWE3 carrying enterprise leased line services on a MAN

PWE3 Deployment

1. IP addresses and IGPs are configured on the carrier MPLS backbone network so that PEs can communicate.
2. MPLS is enabled on the carrier MPLS backbone network, and a TE tunnel is configured between PE1 and PE2. Usually, two TE tunnels are configured to provide tunnel protection.
3. MPLS L2VPN is enabled on PE1 and PE2 and a remote MPLS LDP session is set up between them.
4. PWE3 is configured on AC interfaces of PE1 and PE2 so that PE1 and PE2 can communicate over an MPLS L2VC.