Starman, a cable operator in the Baltic States, has decided to make investment in a 10-gigabit Ethernet Passive Optical Network (10G EPON).
Nokia said the new network will let Starman deliver broadband services to residential customers in Estonia and meet growing customer demand for high-speed, high-quality triple-play (voice, Internet and cable) services. Starman will gradually roll out the network in Q4 2016 throughout Estonia after lab and field tests.
Starman is seeing a shift from broadcast TV to on-demand TV and video services, and Internet traffic is growing about 50 percent.
The investment strategy of Starman is to ensure that its network can deliver 1Gbps speeds to each customer in the near term and up to 10Gbps when required.
The contract shows how cable operators globally are considering deep fiber and fiber-to-the-home deployments as a realistic and cost-effective alternative to upgrading their current DOCSIS3.0 Hybrid Fiber Coax networks to 3.1, in order to meet subscriber demands.
Nokia 10G EPON solution allow the reuse of existing ducts in the street, and Starman can leverage their in-house cabling rights to bring fiber to each apartment.
Nokia said the solution supports DOCSIS provisioning over EPON (DPoE), which allows for a low-touch integration into the existing cable network and DOCSIS back-end systems. The solution also includes Nokia’s Optical Network Termination (ONT) devices, providing consumers with the latest generation gigabit Wi-Fi technology.
“When investing in the Internet services we bring to our customers’ home, ensuring the technology is future-proof is essential. Today we are choosing solutions that can allow for symmetrical connections greater than 1Gbps, enabling us to skip some current technological developments and take a seat on the new high-speed 10G train,” said Starman Group Technology director Jaanus Erlemann.
64.5 million customers in the European Union have Cable networks. Starman’s fiber optic cable network in the Baltic States reaches more than 721,000 homes.
