Telecom Lead India: Huawei has developed an embedded optical time domain reflectometer (eOTDR) prototype with a split ratio of up to 1:64.
Emulation tests on live networks have shown that this prototype can accurately locate faults to within five meters, meaning that eOTDR technology is ready for commercial use on fiber to the home (FTTH) passive optical networks (PONs).
An optical time domain reflectometer (OTDR), which uses scattered light in fibers to make measurements is primarily used for fiber testing and troubleshooting.
Traditionally, FTTH PON maintenance and troubleshooting is performed through external OTDR equipment. This approach incurs fiber connection changes in an optical distribution network (ODN), and is costly and operationally complex.
With the rapid expansion of fiber to the x (FTTx) and the exponential growth of fibers, the need for reduced fiber maintenance costs is increasing all the time.
Huawei’s new eOTDR prototype offers cost-effective fiber maintenance by embedding OTDR functionality into an optical line terminal (OLT) PON optical module and operating at the same wavelength as user data. OTDR-embedded optical modules are the same size as common optical modules and can be easily deployed on FTTx for troubleshooting.
This approach does not require engineering reconstruction such as fiber connection changes or adaptation of optical network terminals (ONTs), nor does it interrupt services during troubleshooting. Utilizing this approach effectively improves fiber troubleshooting efficiency and reduces costs, setting the eOTDR prototype up for promising market prospects.
Huawei’s eOTDR prototype achieves a split ratio of 1:64 and covers mainstream FTTH scenarios, moving eOTDR technology another stage closer to large-scale commercial deployment.
Huawei’s SingleFAN solution served one third of the world’s broadband subscribers at the end of 2012. According to leading consulting firms such as Infonetics, Ovum, and Broadbandtrends, Huawei’s SingleFAN portfolio has topped the global PON and digital subscriber line (DSL) markets for three consecutive years.
