High-fibre diet for
a new generation
Mobile and fixed-network operators are looking to optical communications
as the way to extend their gigabit coverage. By Chris Edwards
This year’s MWC was meant to
provide a showcase for the 5G
network technology now making
its way into the deployment phase.
The mobile industry was keen to tout
the benefits of the protocol over its
predecessor. Lower latency and high
bandwidth would power applications
from virtual reality to robotics.
Such grand plans naturally
attracted scepticism as technologies
such as virtual reality have been
through many false dawns and market
acceptance does not look that much
better than five years or a decade
ago.
At the analyst’s forecast meeting
in London earlier this year, Future
Horizons president Malcolm
Penn pointed to 5G as one of
the technology industry’s regular
problems of creating “a solution
looking for a market”. And yet, the
cancellation of MWC may have
provided 5G with the kind of boost it
needs: a way to deliver effective telepresence
in an environment where
people are suddenly forced to work
remotely.
However, the telecom industry has
a second problem. Gartner expects
the premium that operators can
charge over 4G to be just 10 per cent,
a scant reward for a massive buildout.
One answer may be for mobile
to build closer links with the fixedtelecom
world in a bid to upgrade the
speed of home and office connections
as governments such as the UK’s
push for gigabit broadband.
To help address the issue, ETSI
kicked off a working group called F5G
that seeks to build standards for
a fibre-optic network that can both
supplement 5G and help deliver the
wireless service to more locations
through the widespread deployment of
much smaller cells.
F5G working-group chairman Luca
Pesando, said: “We feel it’s strongly
needed. We need a base to match the
pace of the mobile networks to have
more services available and have a
better reach for all users.”
A problem identified by people
such as Oğuzkağan Kanlıdere, senior
architect for fixed-access networks
at Turk Telecom, is that today the
internet service providers and mobile
operators are deploying infrastructure
based on internally developed
architectures with piecemeal use of
existing standard protocols.
Such networks lack the economies
of scale that comes with widespread
standardisation as well as the ability
for operators to work together in
the way they could with a converged
network architecture.
Above: Equipment
vendors are
suggesting that
organisations which
put the fibre in the
ground will acquire a
significant user base
“There are many vendors, each
with their own views of execution and
all the ISPs have different views on
execution. Standardisation is a must
for fixed access networks,” Kanlıdere
argues.
ETSI’s plan is to use a similar
approach to standardisation as that
employed for cellular.
“The evolution of mobile been
characterised by generations. What
about fixed networks? Well, it’s
been nothing like that. There are
no formal generations. Rather there
has been an evolutionary continuum.
Nobody has ever spoken about
what one generation or the next
generation could be. And there are
many standards bodies that work in
the field. All of them do very good
work but in an uncorrelated way and
sometimes their activities are not so
easy to coordinate.”
Huawei ahead of the curve
Although the ETSI group has only
started work formally in the past
30 24 March 2020 www.newelectronics.co.uk
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