AUGUST 23, 2010 -- The 30,000 residents of Salisbury, NC, will receive new telecommunications options as a result of an upcoming city-driven fiber to the home (FTTH) deployment. The project, which has been branded Fibrant under the heading "Make Life Brilliant," will leverage fiber management equipment from Clearfield, Inc. (Nasdaq:CLFD) both in the field and at the central office.
When it launches this fall, Fibrant will initially offer a "triple play" of voice, video, and data services that will rival anything the big name service providers can offer, asserts Salisbury Director of Broadband Services Michael Crowell.
"We'll be offering a better product that provides fiber all the way to the home," Crowell says. "We'll have much more bandwidth than the others, and we'll be offering a superior level of customer service."
As an example, Crowell noted that Fibrant will provide four HD streams into the home -- something that has not been available in this market previously. This technological advantage is especially attractive to the younger demographic, the city believes. In fact, one of the primary goals of Fibrant is to attract and retain younger professionals.
The FTTH project, covering 18 square miles and connecting an estimated 12,000 homes and businesses, was launched in 2006. Clearfield was selected, via fiber contractor Atlantic Engineering, to streamline the fiber management both in the central office and in the field. With Clearfield's FieldSmart Fiber Crossover Distribution System (FxDS) patch panels in its head-end operation, the city will benefit from the highest density fiber management in the industry, Clearfield asserts. Out in the field, Fibrant has 68 of Clearfield's FieldSmart Fiber Scalability Centers (FSC) or PON splitter cabinets -- each of which can feed up to 288 customers.
"For four years we looked at a lot of alternatives. Ultimately, we selected Clearfield's cabinets because of their size and compactness. We didn't want to go into our neighborhoods and install refrigerator-sized boxes. We knew the people wouldn't like that," according to Crowell. "Clearfield had a definite advantage of size. They're small and compact. Most people don't even know they're there."
The first phase of Fibrant is expected to be completed in the fourth quarter of this year. Phase two of the project, which would add gaming, security, and wireless options, is currently being discussed.
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