WCA May 2008

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26 Wire & Cable ASIA – May/June 2008
Fibre to the home (FTTH) is exactly
what the name suggests: fibre optic
communication delivery in which the
optical signal reaches the end user’s
living or office quarters. And now,
after the fifth annual FTTH Council
Europe, held 27 th-28th February in Paris,
its environmental benefits are likely to
be promoted along with its general
service value.
Joeri Van Bogaert, president of FTTH
Council Europe, reported on research
that will provide a foundation for
further inquiry into the subject by the
group. He said, “The results clearly
demonstrate the overall service and
environmental benefits of FTTH.
They stand as testament that fibre
is a sustainable and future-proof
technology for the 21st Century.”
Writing in Telecommunications magazine,
Kendrick Struthers-Watson noted the
council’s findings that, even as it
maximises opportunity for new servi-
ces while minimising the materials
and maintenance required, FTTH
contributes to reduced road travel,
less transport infrastructure, and the
introduction of innovative services.
(“It’s Official: Fiber Is Environmentally
Friendly,” 28th February)
For its analysis of the impact of an
FTTH network, the study took into
account the full life-cycle of a typical
fibre infrastructure – from production of
passive equipment and transport,
through implementation of all active
equipment and power consumption, to
the end of service life. The council
worked with the projection of 20 million
FTTH users by 2015 supplied by IDATE,
the European market analysis and
consulting firm. The researchers found
that, for the first 15 years of net-
work implementation, greenhouse gas
emission savings-per-user were found
to be 330kg: equivalent to the
emissions of a car driven for 2,000
kilometres. Christian Ollivry, Chair of
the Council’s Sustainable Develop-
ment and FTTH Committee, told
Telecommunications, “Beyond the
15-year time scale, which is quite
conservative, the research shows that
FTTH provides only positives for
Europe.”
Power consumption represents only
6% of the total environmental impact
over the full network life cycle, while
the production and deployment of the
equipment totals over 80%.
Mr Struthers-Watson noted, however,
that “with continuing innovations taking
place in the industry these processes
are becoming cheaper, quicker, and
less disruptive, [holding promise of]
reducing the environmental impact and
further increasing the sustainability of
fibre networks over time.”
Tata reports deployment of
‘world’s largest commercial
WiMax network’
Tata Communications reported on
4th March that Telsima Corp has been
chosen to provide infrastructure for the
WiMax network Tata is building to
serve more than 110 cities in India.
Telsima (Sunnyvale, California) is a
provider of WiMax solutions that
enable mobile, multimedia, 4G wire-
less networks.
WiMax – worldwide interoperability for
microwave access – is defined by the
WiMax Forum as ‘a standards-based
technology enabling the delivery of
last-mile wireless broadband access as
an alternative to cable and DSL.’
For the Tata project, Telsima will
deploy 3,000 base stations. Tata said
that the deployment of the wide-area
high-speed wireless network – already
underway and serving more than 5,000
customers in 10 cities – will be the
largest commercial WiMax network in
the world.
“The Indian broadband market, which
today serves only 3.1 million customers
in a nation with a population of over
1.2 billion, is forecast to grow
significantly,” said Shankar Prasad,
Europe’s biggest engineering conglomerate, Siemens AG, will cut 6,800 jobs
at the corporate telecommunications division it has had up for sale for some
two years now. The cuts will affect about 39% of the 17,600 workers at
Siemens Enterprise Communications, and are the biggest reductions
announced by the German company since 2006, when the newly created
Nokia Siemens Networks venture said that it would eliminate 9,000 jobs. The
unit makes such products as the Siemens Gigaset for business.
Munich-based Siemens said on 26th February that it would eliminate about
3,800 jobs outright, and about 3,000 more as factories are sold or partnerships
set up. About 3,200 of the jobs are in Germany, according to Siemens, which
will also sell or find partners for the telecom unit’s operations in Greece and
Brazil, and sell call centres in Argentina, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.
As recapped from London by Simon Thiel of Bloomberg News , Siemens put
the Enterprise unit on the block when it created a network partnership with
Finland’s Nokia, the market leader in cellphone manufacturing. Recently,
contacts about disposition of the unit were reported between Siemens and
companies including Alcatel-Lucent, Nortel Networks, and buyout firm
Cerberus Partners. “Something had to happen as the unit just doesn’t fit into
the [Siemens] portfolio any more,” analyst Michael Bahlmann, of MM Warburg,
said in a telephone interview with Bloomberg. He added, “The job cuts will
hopefully make it easier” to sell the business. (“Siemens to Cut 6,800 Jobs at
Enterprise Division,” 26th February)
Siemens is seeking a deal with either “a strategic buyer” or “a financial investor
who has some operational experience in that market,” the company’s chief
financial officer Joe Kaeser told reporters at a press conference in Munich.
Siemens would be open to operating the corporate network division in a joint
venture for a transitional period, Mr Kaeser said, although it wants to exit the
business at some point. Mr Thiel noted that the unit is Siemens’s last remaining
telecommunications asset apart from cordless phones. Siemens was founded
on telegraphy services 160 years ago, and the telecom division – one of its six
major businesses – was the company’s largest before the partnership with
Nokia was created. The division bore the brunt of job cuts as demand dried up
after 2000.
Hoping for a sale, Siemens slashes jobs at its last
remaining telecom asset
FTTH Council Europe sees environmental benefits
to fibre use