3 Steps to Build a Winning 10G PON Strategy For Your Network
The work-from-home trend that accelerated during the quarantine period is here to stay. A 2022 Gallup Survey of US-based employees indicated that eight of 10 have hybrid or fully remote working arrangements. Broadband services are now essential. This puts broadband service providers (BSPs) under the spotlight to provide fast, secure, and stable symmetrical connections to support critical applications from home. As a result, BSPs are assessing their access network plans to ensure they can meet rising broadband service demands.
Passive Optical Networks Meet Subscriber Demands
Many providers—even wireless, satellite, cable, or utilities—deploy passive optical networks (PON) to deliver broadband services. The ability to provide high-speed symmetrical bandwidth and low latency to support superior subscriber experiences is an important reason BSPs adopt PON strategies. PON also provides a long-term future-proof investment that allows flexible migration and won’t require an expensive upgrade after only a few years.
As demand for higher broadband speeds increases across the board, new standards are already being developed to ensure that fiber assets and optical bandwidth are used efficiently, networks support faster broadband services, and new technologies. Today, there are six varieties of PON that support up to 10 Gbps or 10G PON—and the industry, with the support of the ITU-T—is driving PON beyond 10 Gbps.
The initial 10G PON standard, XG-PON, was introduced in 2010 and delivered a bandwidth of 10 Gbps upstream and 2.5 Gbps downstream. XGS-PON superseded this in 2016, which operates synchronously, delivering symmetrical 10 Gbps up and down. 50G-PON, introduced in 2021, is the next recognized standard and the industry’s choice for economically deploying converged networks and private line multi-gig services.
3 Steps To Build Your 10G PON Network of the Future
New PON providers must keep pace with technology innovation and deploy new revenue-generating services that are scalable, fast to turn up and drive operational efficiencies in an agile, “software-first” environment. Networks that evolve to support emerging technologies and offer greater functionality and scalability will thrive.
Here are three steps to build your 10G PON network:
Step 1: Deploy widely available, fully standardized XGS-PON technology in new builds or expansion regions. Where you have GPON deployed today, add XGS-PON as the market dictates, using multi-PON module technology to support standard service offerings and ensure a future-proof network.
Step 2: Choose an operating software (OS) built for software-defined access networks and enables a simplified network architecture with common operational workflows across all services. This OS must have a hardware and software abstraction layer that emulates the underlying hardware, isolating the reusable modules above from the low-level chipset drivers so you can adopt new technology without impacting subscriber services. The OS is modular and includes tools and connectors to reduce service integration and turn-up—and diagnosis tools to ensure service remains always on. In addition, the OS allows workflow automation capabilities across the network that enable BSPs to get to market faster, reduce truck rolls, and be more operationally efficient. Calix’s Network Innovation Platform, AXOS, is an excellent example of a software-defined access OS that checks all boxes.
Step 3: Ensure that the OS you choose can be deployed to all subscribers across your network—whether they are served by a data center, headend, central office, remote cabinet, or even remote locations where cabinets are not financially viable. This ensures common operational workflows across the entire deployment so that you can reap the benefits of workflow automation and simplification.
Redefining The Access Edge
By decoupling the hardware and software layers and moving to a software-defined environment, BSPs can redefine the access edge of the network. This solution approach will help build networks capable of delivering subscriber services for decades and ensure that their 10G PON deployments will provide a highly efficient and adaptable network for the future—even as demand for bandwidth continues to rise.
Related Articles
