Verizon to spend $18 billion on fiber network
New financial and operational details on what it is calling the most advanced broadband fiber-optic services (FiOS) network being deployed in America were disclosed by Verizon Communications (New York, NY). Verizon said it expects to invest $18 billion in net capital from 2004 through 2010 to bring the broadband capacity of fiber optics all the way to customers’ homes and businesses.
Verizon reported that its FiOS Internet is gaining share against competitive services in a growing broadband market, and is also seeing strong customer demand for FiOS TV, which was launched in its first market just a year ago. Verizon’s goal is for FiOS TV to have a market penetration rate that ranges from 20% to 25% by 2010-or from 3 million to 4 million customers-based on its estimate that approximately 15 million households will be video-ready by then.
FTTH agreements inked by Enablence
Enablence Technologies (Ottawa, ON, Canada), a developer of fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) products-in particular, planar-lightwave-circuit (PLC) triplexers and diplexers that are capable of processing optical signals at low cost-has entered into a cooperation agreement with Kotura (Monterey Park, CA) for the development of triplexer chips and a supply agreement with Ignis Photonyx’s wafer fab outside Copenhagen, Denmark.
“Enablence is pleased to further our relationship with Kotura,” said Arvind Chhatbar, CEO. “We believe that our triplexer chips can be manufactured in volume using standard CMOS processes. Enablence also entered into a large-volume supply agreement for a minimum of two years with Ignis Photonyx. Ignis will fabricate wafers using Enablence’s proprietary Dispersion Bridge technology.
Infinera engineers win Aron Kressel Award
Infinera (Sunnyvale, CA) engineers, Charles Joyner, Radha Nagarajan, and Richard Schneider, will be honored with the Aron Kressel IEEE Laser & Electro-Optics Society (LEOS; www.i-leos.org) Award for their contribution to the development of the Infinera photonic integrated circuit (PIC). The annual award recognizes important contributions to optoelectronic device technology, with an emphasis on technology that has found its way into widespread usage.
Infinera PICs incorporate more than 50 optical components on a single chip approximately 5 mm square, including ten lasers, each transmitting data at a rate of 10 Gbit/s. “The Infinera PIC team made numerous breakthroughs in terms of design, process, specification, system architecture, and manufacturability that made the PIC a reality today,” said Dave Welch, chief strategy officer for Infinera.
Intel sells optical- components business
Cortina Systems (Sunnyvale, CA) and Intel (Santa Clara, CA) have completed the sale of product lines and associated assets of Intel’s optical-networking components business to Cortina.
The acquisition will give Cortina a large portfolio of enterprise and infrastructure communications products and will position it to become a leading communications semiconductor company. The sale will enable Intel to focus on its core communications and embedded businesses.
T-Com invests in CoreOptics
T-Com Venture Fund, a corporate venture fund of the broadband/fixed-network division of Deutsche Telekom (Bonn, Germany), has invested in the CoreOptics (Nuremberg, Germany, and Manchester, NH), a designer and manufacturer of 10 and 40 Gbit/s optical-networking subsystems. “This is indeed a strong validation of our company, our product portfolio and the future roadmap of our business to deliver innovative products to our carrier customers for their faster and more cost-effective service delivery,” said Hamid Arabzadeh, CoreOptics president and CEO.
Also in the news . . .
NeoPhotonics (San Jose, CA), a supplier of fiber-optic component and module solutions for long-haul, metro, and FTTX networks, announced that the company has shipped its 100,000th variable optical attenuator (VOA) from LightConnect (Newark, CA), its wholly owned subsidiary. . . . ExceLight Communications announced that Sumitomo Electric Industries/ExceLight (Durham, NC), developer of Ethernet communications products, has become a participating member of the Ethernet Alliance, an industry group dedicated to the continued success and expansion of Ethernet technology. . . . According to a story in The Ottawa Citizen, Metconnex (Ottawa, ON, Canada), an optical-networking startup that raised $8.1 million in venture capital earlier this year, has closed its doors. . . . Bookham (Caswell, England), a provider of communications optical components, modules and subsystems, achieved the International Standard ISO 17025 for testing and calibration and can now provide independent test data on Bookham products and can offer an independent testing service to other companies.