Clearfield, Inc. (NASDAQ:CLFD) on Aug. 31 announced the addition of the FieldSmart FiberFlex 3000 outdoor cabinet to the company's portfolio of active cabinet solutions.
The specialist in fiber management for communication service providers (CSPs) observes that service providers are placing more active equipment deeper into the network, and its FieldSmart FiberFlex series is designed to protect, power, and manage this active equipment as well as aggregate the fiber connections.
The company says the new cabinet series eliminates unsightly box farms for better site space utilization, consolidates power and cooling for better efficiency, and offers factory integration options saving time and labor at the job site. The cabinet's modular design allows side-to-side field expansion as needed.
As stated by Clearfield:
As network operators look to deploy fiber to support a wider range of applications and deployment scenarios, the FieldSmart FiberFlex 3000's all-in-one design integrates fiber, power, and active equipment.
The [cabinet's] flexible design makes it the ideal active cabinet to help operators close the digital divide by supporting remote optical line terminals (OLTs) with passive optical network (PON) distribution, wireless base stations with fiber backhaul aggregation, and active network equipment with back-up power needs.
The FiberFlex 3000 features a 19- or 23-inch vertical equipment frame to provide 36 rack units (RU) for active electronics and passive equipment with no batteries, 30RU with one string of batteries, or 20RU with two strings of batteries.
Measuring 72”H x 30”W x 36”D, Clearfield says this multi-use enclosure's utility makes it easy to drop into any pad or vault mount option. The enclosures accommodates both traditional telco equipment (12” depth) and server blades (30” depth) with HVAC, heat exchanger or direct air cooling options.
Each FieldSmart FiberFlex 3000 provides up to 864 internal fiber distribution ports for subscriber PON deployments, along with complementary splitter capacity, and accepts local AC power via the integrated AC Load Center equipped with a generator plug for back-up power.
FieldSmart FiberFlex 3000 Data Sheet
In keeping with Clearfield’s craft-friendly modular designs, the manufacturer notes the system's open racks and cable entry ports with a removable plate facilitate ease of installation and field expansion.
Scalability for application breadth
Clearfield states that its FiberFlex 3000 platform is intended to enable emerging applications such as smart city IoT, wireless 5G ORAN, and Metro Edge services that require powered elements such as compute processors, servers, and fiber aggregation be placed closer to the end users.
“Fiber deployments are scaling at record pace as operators look to leverage demand for the services and applications that are driving the economy forward,” observes Nate Jacobsen, Product Manager for Outside Plant Products at Clearfield.
Jacobsen concludes, “There is no 'one size fits all' solution but the FiberFlex 3000 provides the density, scalability and flexibility service providers need so they can target any application, streamline service introduction and reach as many subscribers as possible.”