Dave, it appears that the Marconi FTH architecture contains many of the same elements we have been discussing, although at only [cough!] 10Mb/s Ethernet today (with gigabit in the future), and very likely still maintaining analog TV, as opposed to an immediate move to digital MPEG delivery. Add some voice channels, and they do this all on a single fiber pulled to the residence using bi-directional wdm. A single fiber approach saves on materials, labor (number of splice points is halved) and reduces the potential points of failure. Good show.
Thanks to Kenneth Phillipps on LMT for this one:
lightreading.com
FAC
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Marconi Launches DSL Killer
ATLANTA, GA: Marconi PLC marconi.com plans to announce a
significant development in fiber-to-the-home technology at the Supercomm show
today. It will unveil equipment that promises to slash the cost of deploying
broadband services over fiber ? possibly denting the prospects of DSL (digital
subscriber line) technology.
Marconi calls its equipment ?Deep Fiber FTH?. With it, a single fiber to a home
can support three phone lines, Internet services via a 10BaseT Ethernet
connection and multiple cable and satellite TV channels.
The key points are these:
Cost. Bell Atlantic bellatlantic.com has been testing Marconi?s
equipment and studying the economics of deploying it widely according to Mark
McDonald, vice president of marketing for Marconi?s access division . The studies
indicate that the overall cost of deploying the system is about $1,100 per home.
This includes $200 for laying the fiber and all of the equipment needed in the
carrier?s network and the home.
?Bell Atlantic tells us that our system is half the cost of any alternative,? says
McDonald. Other vendors with existing fiber-to-the-home solutions include Alcatel
SA alcatel.com, Lucent Technologies Inc. lucent.com and
Fujitsu Ltd. fujitsu.com.
More significantly, the cost of deploying Marconi?s gear is in the same ball park
as deploying DSL, according to McDonald. ?That?s what Bell Atlantic is so
excited about, ? he says. For the same investment, it could deliver much higher
bandwidth services than are possible over DSL. Laying fiber to homes would also
pave the way for future developments.
Flexibility. Marconi?s equipment supports twin wavelengths to each home, one
for carrying interactive traffic such as phone connections and Internet access,
and the other for carrying one-way TV broadcasts. Each wavelength can be set
up individually, as and when customers order services.
This makes for much more efficient use of infrastructure than installing gigabit
Ethernet to do the same thing, according to McDonald. With gigabit Ethernet, if
one customer wants to have TV and the rest don?t, the carrier is faced with
upgrading the whole network to provide it ? an uneconomic proposition, he
contends. With Marconi?s system, the carrier simply sets up another wavelength
to the customer that wants TV, leaving everybody else with what they?re paying
for.
It?s worth noting that a handful of vendors are developing
gigabit-Ethernet-to-the-home products for the same market. They argue that they
can get way below the $1,100 a home quoted by Marconi, and that costs will be
so low that the issue of using equipment efficiently won?t be of paramount
importance.
Ease of Use . Marconi carries analog as well as digital signals on its
wavelengths, which means that equipment installed in homes allows customers
to plug in their existing equipment ? phones, PCs, TV sets. They?re not forced to
buy new gear, as they might be with alternative solutions. Offering high bandwidth
Internet access at the same time as analog phone connections gives customers
the option of using voice-over-IP.
Low Risk. Marconi?s Deep Fiber FTH is an extension of its existing
fiber-to-the-curb technology, which is already in widely deployed. 2 million lines
have been installed to date, according to McDonald. The system uses passive
optical network (PON) technology to make more efficient use of fiber in access
networks (see PONs: Passive Aggression ).
As noted, Bell Atlantic has been testing Marconi?s equipment and plans to start
trials this summer, according to McDonald. General availability is scheduled for
the end of the year.
By Peter Heywood, International Editor, Light Reading,
lightreading.com |
