Today's Top Stories It took AT&T (NYSE: T) less than a few hours to announce it also plans to offer a 1 Gbps fiber to the home service following Google Fiber's (Nasdaq: GOOG) highly anticipated announcement in Austin, Texas. But when will AT&T's 1 Gbps FTTH network be available? Other than saying that the "expanded investment is not expected to materially alter AT&T's anticipated 2013 capital expenditures," the carrier did not provide any specific deployment timeline. Google, meanwhile, said it will start connecting homes in Austin in mid-2014, offering the same broadband service options that Kansas City residents can get today. The other issue that will impact how fast AT&T rolls out the service will lie in their ability to get the same permitting concessions that Google Fiber got in Kansas City to install fiber cable on existing utility poles. "AT&T's expanded fiber plans in Austin anticipate it will be granted the same terms and conditions as Google on issues such as geographic scope of offerings, rights of way, permitting, state licenses and any investment incentives," AT&T said in a release about their 1 Gbps plans. Today's reality is that AT&T's broadband capabilities don't come even near 1 Gbps. In Austin, AT&T U-verse customers can get up to 24 Mbps of bandwidth. As part of its Project VIP initiative, AT&T had said that it would deliver, in various areas, up to 45 Mbps and later 75 Mbps using a mix of IP-DSLAMS, VDSL2 and vectoring. Meanwhile, Time Warner Cable (NYSE: TWC), another one of Google Fiber's competitors in Austin, welcomed Google's move. "We're prepared for added competition and believe that any innovation in broadband technology is good for all of us," a spokesperson told the Wall Street Journal. TWC's statement supporting Google's FTTH plan contradicts its dismissive attitude towards 1 Gbps services. Last December, Rob Marcus, TWC's COO, questioned whether anyone actually needs a 1 Gbps connection, saying his company can provide it if someone wants such a high-bandwidth service. "It will be interesting to find out whether there are applications that will take advantage of a 1 Gbps service," Marcus was quoted as saying in a DSL Reports article. "If there is [a need for speed], we will provide it; our infrastructure has the ability to provide much faster speeds today. We're prepared to compete head-to-head with Google." For more:
- here's the AT&T release
- Wall Street Journal has this article (sub req.) Related articles:
AT&T to extend wireline IP network to 57M customer locations
Google Fiber comes to Austin, mayor announces
Report: Google Fiber to challenge AT&T and Time Warner Cable in Austin
Google's Schmidt: Kansas City is just one stop on FTTH journey Read more about: AT&T
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ADTRAN (Nasdaq: ADTN) made a comeback in Q1 2013, reporting gains in both the broadband access and optical segments of its carrier product division. The company reported $72.2 million and $8.8 million in revenues, for broadband access and optical access, respectively. In addition, internetworking revenues, which include its NetVanta and Multi-service Access Gateways, reached $36.9 million. As expected, the vendor reported that legacy product revenues, including its HDSL business, declined slightly to $24.9 million sequentially. From a regional perspective, U.S. sales were $108 million and international were $34.9 million. During the quarter, overall sales were $143 million, up from $134 million in Q1 2012. However, net income declined year-over-year to $7.8 million from $12.9 million in Q1 2012. "Operating results for the quarter came in as expected with our domestic carrier business continuing to solidify and our overall revenue positively impacted by sequential growth internationally and in our Enterprise business," said Tom Stanton, CEO of ADTRAN, in the earnings release. Shares of ADTRAN were listed at $22.04, up $2.33, or 11.80 percent, in Wednesday morning trading on the Nasdaq stock exchange. For more:
- see the earnings release Special report: Bonding telcos' love affair with copper through VDSL2 Related articles:
ADTRAN, Alcatel-Lucent, others participate in VDSL2 plugfest at Univ. of New Hampshire
ADTRAN's Q4 sales slide to $139.7 million
Greece's Forthnet launches FTTH pilot in Athens
VDSL equipment revenue rose 15% in Q2, says Dell'Oro Read more about: Optical Network, Adtran
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Verizon (NYSE: VZ) and NEC tested the ability to transmit 40.5 Tbps over a distance of 1,800 km and 54.2 Tbps over a regional distance of more than 630 km, using one of its existing fiber loops outside Dallas. The higher speeds were achieved using tightly packed optical channels in both the C-band and the L-band of the fiber spectrum. Earlier field transmission trials used a single optical band. This trial, which was conducted in late 2012, was presented as a post-deadline paper at the OFC/NFOEC Conference and Expo last month in Anaheim, Calif. Last March, Verizon and NEC conducted a similar trial transmitting 21.7 Tbps over 1,503 km of standard single mode field fiber on the telco's network in the Dallas area. A key point of these trials is that they are using existing fiber, a characteristic that's important to large carriers that want to save capital while gaining expanding network speeds to support the growth of consumer and business wireline and wireless traffic. While this demonstration was largely experimental, Verizon said they allow them to "test the feasibility and related efficiencies of deploying up to 40 Tb/s for long haul distances and more than 50 Tb/s for regional distances." For more:
- see the release Special report: The 10 hottest wireline technologies in 2013 Related articles:
Verizon, NEC conduct Terabit speed optical transmission field trial
Verizon working with NYC on faster fiber deployment
Verizon takes on copper theft in Pa., offering $50,000 reward
Telcos see 20% operational savings with all-fiber networks, says FTTH Council Read more about: Verizon
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Australia's Liberal-National coalition political party has proposed an alternative plan for the country's National Broadband Network (NBN) that would use fiber to the node (FTTN), rather than fiber to the premises (FTTP) to deliver 25 Mbps speeds to the country's residents and businesses. Opposition Leaders Tony Abbott and Shadow Communications Minister Malcolm Turnbull said their plan will cost only AUD 29 billion (USD 30.5 billion) versus the AUD 44 billion (USD 46.3 billion) to AUD 94 billion (USD 98.9 billion) for the current FTTP plan. On a per-customer basis, the Coalition's plan will cost AUD 66 (USD 69.50) per month per household versus AUD 90 (USD 95.00). Initially targeting regions that have little or no broadband options, users will be able to get 25 Mbps to 100 Mbps speeds by the end of 2016, with the minimum speed rising to 50 Mbps by the end of 2019 for 90 percent of existing wireline broadband subscribers. "At the end of a first term of a Coalition government, there will be minimum download speeds of 25 Mbps. By the end of our second term, the vast majority of households will get access to 50 Mbps," Opposition Leader Tony Abbott said about the Coalition's broadband policy in Sydney on Tuesday. "We will be able to do this because we will build fiber to the node, and that eliminates two-thirds of the cost." If the Coalition wins the election this upcoming September, it plans to bring FTTP only to 22 percent of Australia's premises, including those already being built by NBN Co., new housing developments, or where the copper plant was too degraded to support 25 Mbps. The other 71 percent of the market would get a FTTN connection via Telsta's (ASX: TLS.AX) existing copper facilities that are connected from the RT cabinet to the home or business. Although the current NBN network is slated to be completed by June 2021, the Coalition says that the recent construction delays that NBN Co. reported last month due to a lack of qualified workers means that the network might not be completed until 2025. Turnbull said that the FTTN network would require about 60,000 RT cabinets, adding that they would be able to renegotiate a new deal to gain access to Telstra's copper facilities quickly. This plan, not surprisingly, was met with opposition from current Communications Minister Stephen Conroy who said that their proposal is "short-sighted." "They don't think about the applications, the extra connectivity, the extra machines, the extra devices that will be connected up by all of you here, all of our children in the future; they don't think about that," he said. For more:
- here's the Coalition party's proposal (.pdf)
- ZDNet has this article Related articles:
Australia NBN faces 3-month delay as rollout stalls
Australia's NBN now covers 784,592 premises Read more about: Fiber to the Node
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As expected, FairPoint Communications (Nasdaq: FRP) is bringing down the axe on 90 wireline positions across Maine, New Hampshire, and Vermont over the next several months. The layoffs aren't a surprise as they were part of a collective bargaining agreement signed last year. In addition to the planned layoffs, FairPoint handed pink slips to 30 managers in March. The 120 total job cuts are expected to save the carrier $11 million, a plus that won't show up in the ledgers until 2014. Severance or incentive payments to the affected employees will run between $5 million and $8 million total. FairPoint, which provides broadband and other communication services to residential and business customers in 17 states, is emerging from a long period of struggle following its purchase of Verizon assets in the New England region in 2008. It declared bankruptcy in 2009 and was sanctioned by the state legislatures of Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont to ensure that it would meet its broadband buildout goals. The telco has made steady progress in its recovery, including making a $10 million prepayment on its existing debt in December 2012 and a $25 million prepayment in September. That's thanks in part to a number of cost-cutting measure including voluntary and involuntary layoffs and a selloff of assets like the November 2012 sale of its Idaho operations to Blackfoot Telecommunications for $30 million in cash. In addition, the telco got a competitive boost when each of the northern New England states relaxed certain regulations so that FairPoint could compete with CLECs on pricing while freezing the price of its PSTN services. Broadband continues to drive the provider's balance sheet. In the fourth quarter of 2012, FairPoint saw a slight decline in revenues, to $240 million. But it added over 12,000 broadband subscribers for the year, a 3.9 percent gain. For more:
- see this release Related articles:
FairPoint's Q4 revenue driven by broadband, Ethernet services
FairPoint Communications makes $10M prepayment on debt
FairPoint's voluntary retirement, layoffs reduce costs by $6.6 million Read more about: Layoffs
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