Cable CTOs Paint Ambitious Future
By LESLIE ELLIS
Denver -- Cable's top technologists are doubly focused on 750-megahertz, two-way plant upgrades and the services that will ride on those networks, they said at the Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers' recent Cable-Tec Expo here.
Saying that the time is right to "seize the opportunities" facing them with digital video, high-speed data and packet-data services, chief technical officers at the top four MSOs chatted about their challenges and workload, focusing on how to "implement the vision" of broadband.
The foursome advised a room of 3,000 onlookers to get busy immediately on digital video and high-speed data.
"There's not a single cable operator that currently shouldn't be planning on launching digital video," said Alex Best, senior vice president of engineering for Cox Communications Inc. Without it, he said, "you don't have 150 channels, so you're going to lose customers to DBS [direct-broadcast satellite]."
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