Field testing of NG-PON2 was completed recently from Verizon's central office in Framingham, MA, to a FiOS customer's home 3 miles away, as well as to a nearby business location. The test used NG-PON2 equipment from Cisco (NASDAQ:CSCO) and PT Inovacao.
The trial consisted of a new optical line terminal (OLT) installed in the Verizon central office, generating four wavelengths of light, each capable of operating at 10G/2.5G. Later versions are envisioned to support the same download and upload speeds of 10G/10G per color. One test transmitted the NG-PON2 signals over a fiber serving live GPON customers, indicating that the network can simultaneously deliver GPON and NG-PON2 on the same fiber. The field trial also tested reliability. A fault in the central office equipment was simulated, and the customer's ONT autonomously tuned to another wavelength, restoring its own 10G service in seconds.
Verizon will issue a request for proposals later this year for the purchase of hardware and software for the NG-PON2 platform. Upgrades on the FTTP network will begin when commercial equipment is available to support business services such as switched Ethernet. The technology upgrade can also be used to support multi-gigabit-speed Internet access services for FiOS customers.
