U.K. lagging behind on FTTH investment
By Donna DonnawitzOctober 12, 2012
At times, I have found myself vehemently denying the truth of something everybody around me thinks of as a fact. Sometimes it's that my favorite sports team isn't as good as I thought they were, others it may be a more serious issue. But the process of my enlightenment is always the same.
To begin, my friends and family all tell me that I'm wrong, and I pretend that I'm smarter than they are (don't we all do that?). Then they keep telling me that I'm wrong and some evidence comes to favor them, but I can still ignore it. Then experts start talking about the issue and I try to continue blindly ignoring all of the evidence before me, if only to vindicate myself. Then there is a point when all of the things that are trying to prove me wrong come together in a single event, and I finally realize the truth.
In the U.K., telecom operators and government bodies have yet to completely admit the truth that fiber-to-the-home networks are the future, but experts are beginning to make convincing arguments.
FTTH status in the U.K.
A recent study from the FTTH Council of Europe analyzed the distribution of FTTH infrastructure around the world, ranking countries in which at least 1 percent of the population has access to the advanced network format. According to a ComputerWeekly report analyzing the study, the U.K. has lagged behind the pack on FTTH adoption that it was not even included in the list. Nadia Babaali, communications director for FTTH Council Europe, told the news source that the U.K. is falling behind largely because many telecoms are trying to sustain operations using copper infrastructure for as long as possible.
"The copper infrastructure is obsolete and the operators know it. In countries where you have a lot of competition - for example from cable operators or from alternative operators - then the incumbents have to switch technologies, but we do not see this situation too much yet in the U.K., so there is no drive from the competition," Babaali told ComputerWeekly.
Importance of media conversion
As countries like the U.K begin to make up for lost time and move toward FTTH infrastructure, the need for fiber to Ethernet media converters will become a critical requirement. Media conversion is a vital part of FTTH infrastructure because it allows the fiber to connect directly to Ethernet systems in homes in a cost-effective manner.
Perle has an extensive range of Managed and Unmanaged Fiber Media Converters to extended copper-based Ethernet equipment over a fiber optic link, multimode to multimode and multimode to single mode fiber up to 160km.
To begin, my friends and family all tell me that I'm wrong, and I pretend that I'm smarter than they are (don't we all do that?). Then they keep telling me that I'm wrong and some evidence comes to favor them, but I can still ignore it. Then experts start talking about the issue and I try to continue blindly ignoring all of the evidence before me, if only to vindicate myself. Then there is a point when all of the things that are trying to prove me wrong come together in a single event, and I finally realize the truth.
In the U.K., telecom operators and government bodies have yet to completely admit the truth that fiber-to-the-home networks are the future, but experts are beginning to make convincing arguments.
FTTH status in the U.K.
A recent study from the FTTH Council of Europe analyzed the distribution of FTTH infrastructure around the world, ranking countries in which at least 1 percent of the population has access to the advanced network format. According to a ComputerWeekly report analyzing the study, the U.K. has lagged behind the pack on FTTH adoption that it was not even included in the list. Nadia Babaali, communications director for FTTH Council Europe, told the news source that the U.K. is falling behind largely because many telecoms are trying to sustain operations using copper infrastructure for as long as possible.
"The copper infrastructure is obsolete and the operators know it. In countries where you have a lot of competition - for example from cable operators or from alternative operators - then the incumbents have to switch technologies, but we do not see this situation too much yet in the U.K., so there is no drive from the competition," Babaali told ComputerWeekly.
Importance of media conversion
As countries like the U.K begin to make up for lost time and move toward FTTH infrastructure, the need for fiber to Ethernet media converters will become a critical requirement. Media conversion is a vital part of FTTH infrastructure because it allows the fiber to connect directly to Ethernet systems in homes in a cost-effective manner.
Perle has an extensive range of Managed and Unmanaged Fiber Media Converters to extended copper-based Ethernet equipment over a fiber optic link, multimode to multimode and multimode to single mode fiber up to 160km.
