In order to provide a network element for switching time-division multiplex signals in a transport network, which allows higher capacity at moderate equipment costs, the network element has a number of input ports (I; IO1-IO8), a number of output ports (O; IO1-IO8) and a switch fabric ( ) SF; 58) interconnecting the input and output ports (IO1-IO8). The switching fabric ( ) SF; 58) is a cell based switch comprising one or more switch modules ( ) SE1-SEn) which are adapted to switch fixed-length cells on the basis of addresses contained in cell headers of the cells. The input ports (I) contain a segmentation device (11) for segmenting an input time-division multiplex signal into fixed-length cells and assigning address information to each cell. The output ports (O) contain a reassembly device (14) for reassembling cells received from said switch fabric (SF; 58) into an output time-division multiplex signal. The address information contains a fabric address (H1, H2) and a TDM address (P0, P1). The switch fabric switches the cells in accordance with the fabric address (H1, H2) to a corresponding output port (O) and the reassembly device (14) reassembles the cells in accordance with the TDM address (P0, P1).