Marconi announced a series of enhancements to its North American access portfolio, including a four-port ADSL plug-in card for its DISC*S MX Broadband Fiber-to-the-Curb (FTTC) solution. The DSL enhancement enables the delivery of full-rate DSL to all subscribers served from the FTTC network. Marconi has also doubled, with plans to quadruple, the telephony capacity of the DISC*S common telephony processing shelf. The company said its FTTC solution was already at or near cost parity with traditional network construction options. Marconi estimates it has shipped over four million lines of Deep Fiber capacity, passing nearly one million homes across North America.
Marconi is also enhancing its FTTH portfolio with a temperature-hardened version of the Optical Network Termination (ONT) device, enabling carriers to terminate the outside plant fiber facility on the outside of the customer building. Marconi has deployed its FTTH solution, called the FTH-1000 system, in a network owned by the City of Palo Alto, Californiahttp://www.marconi.com
- On 29-May-03, BellSouth, SBC Communications and Verizon agreed on a common set of specifications for fiber to the premises (FTTP) local access networks. The common technical requirements will be based on existing technical standards. The three service providers have issued a letter to telecom equipment manufacturers, alerting them that the providers will soon be seeking proposals for equipment based on the common requirements. The companies will independently finalize their FTTP deployment plans for 2004 and beyond based on the evaluation of these proposals, ongoing internal studies, and on the resolution of related regulatory issues.