Author Archives

Liz Goldsmith

Tomorrow’s 5G Killer Apps And The Network That Will Empower Them

By on • ( Leave a comment )

What kinds of use cases will ultimately become killer apps on the 5G network? Without question, 5G will improve existing services and support expanded capabilities for the future. With reliable always-on connectivity, low latency, and substantial increases in bandwidth, tomorrow’s 5G networks will fundamentally transform the way that businesses and consumers interact with technology. Arguably the most important feature of 5G will be seamless connectivity across multiple device types and settings. The internet of things (IoT), along with other technologies at the edge of the network, will leverage this capability to enhance traditional markets and create entirely new ones. In fact, in a 2018 Gartner survey, 66% of companies surveyed plan to deploy 5G-based IoT applications by 2020.

Subtleties of bend-insensitive multimode fiber

By on • ( Leave a comment )

While the industry has justifiably regarded the development of bend-insensitive OM3 fibers as an advancement, there has been at least one unexpected consequence. We have observed unusual, high multimode OTDR attenuation rates (hereafter “rates”), in both bend-insensitive fibers and bend-insensitive cables.These high rates can result in rejection of properly installed cables due to excessive attenuation rates, misinterpretation of rate values, and improper interpretation of such rates during troubleshooting activities. These high rates can result in misinterpretation of OTDR data from data centers, as data centers have relatively short fiber lengths, in which these increased rates occur.

Four candidates vying to be BICSI’s President-Elect

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Four candidates are currently on the slate to be BICSI’s President-Elect: Carol Everett Oliver, Chris Scharrer, Gautier Humbert, Larry Gillen. Elections will take place throughout the month of September. The victorious candidate will begin their two-year terms and assume their duties during BICSI’s 2020 Winter Conference, which will take place February 9-13. Also at that time, BICSI’s current President-Elect, Todd Taylor, will assume the office of President for a two-year term.

How best to interpret OTDR traces?

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Improper use or interpretation of OTDR test results can result in wasted time, materials and money. Estimates indicated contractors lose as much as $100,000 annually due to improperly reading OTDR test results. OTDRs are often used to create a “picture” of a fiber optic cable when it is first installed so later comparisons can be made to help with troubleshooting network problems. OTDRs send pulses of light into optical fibers at varying pulse widths. Then, they measure the small amounts of reflected light that are sent back from faults in the fibers. The device then determines the size and distance of the faults, and defines them as losses or changes in the cable’s light-carrying capacity.

Furukawa Electric, Superior Essex pursue global manufacturing collaboration

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Furukawa Electric Co. and Superior Essex Inc. are pursuing global collaboration, targeting the Chinese and North American markets.The companies  established German joint venture company, “Essex Furukawa Magnet Wire Europe GmbH” (Superior Essex: 51%, Furukawa: 49%), in March 2017 with the intent to supply high-voltage winding wire and other sophisticated products such as HVWW to the European market.

$7.5B smart city project announced in Las Vegas Valley

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Real estate investment trust Bleutech Park Properties announced plans for a $7.5 billion project in the Las Vegas Valley that will showcase a range of smart city technology, from autonomous vehicles to internet of things (IoT) devices to smart buildings with “self-healing concrete.” The project will break ground in December and is projected to take six years to complete.
 

Integration is Key to a Smart Building’s Success or Failure

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Fixing the integration problem is fast becoming a key challenge for the smart building sector to overcome according to many experts. “Successful digital transformation is like a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. It’s still the same organism, but it now has superpowers,” says George Westerman, a research scientist at the MIT Center for Digital Business. When digital transformation is done wrong, however, “all you have is a really fast caterpillar,” he points out, “and it’s hard to keep up with your competitors if you’re crawling ahead while they can fly.”

Decoding ROI for Smart Buildings

By on • ( Leave a comment )

The rise of connected things within smart buildings has led many CRE firms to embark on a new kind of digital transformation. However, the ROI for many organizations has been elusive, particularly because IoT platforms require significant development costs to address their business potential.

 Multi-Fiber Push-On Connector Advantages

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Seasoned industry professionals may recall the excruciating, painstaking days of installing and connecting countless fibers, one at a time. As the number of data centers grew exponentially in the 2000s, designers and installers were tasked with managing hundreds and even thousands of single- and 2-fiber connector solutions. To accommodate the high volume of connectors within ever-tighter space constraints, installers and designers were forced to create more elaborate storage and routing solutions that came with their own set of challenges. Fortunately, those days are long gone – thanks in large part to the emergence of the multi-fiber push-on (MPO) connector. The MPO format dramatically reduced the amount of time, effort, and space required to install and deploy network technologies, particularly in parallel optic applications.

Proposal for an SDN-Like Innovative Metro-Access Optical Network Architecture

By on • ( Leave a comment )

Telecommunication operators are facing an epochal challenge due to the need of higher reconfigurability, flexibility, and dynamicity for their networks. In the latest years, this necessity has been addressed by the introduction of Software-Defined Networking (SDN), mainly in the fields of data centers and core networks. The present work introduces a unified metro-access optical network architecture based on some features inspired by SDN models. The essential aim is to enable bandwidth shared among different passive optical networks (PONs) in order to achieve higher adaptability to increasingly migratory and volatile traffic patterns.