3 March 2003 -- France Telecom is using the country's SDSL infrastructure to expand its range of high-speed solutions for businesses. New services offer symmetric IP access with guaranteed bandwidth of up to 2Mbit/s.
High-speed SDSL (Symmetric Digital Subscribe Line) technology has been available nationwide in France in all areas where DSL is offered since the beginning of February 2003.
SDSL is part of the "xDSL" family of technologies that enables data exchanges at symmetric speeds, meaning that downstream and upstream speeds are the same. The service is complementary to ADSL service and also runs on copper telephone wire pairs in the France Telecom network.
It enables high-speed connections at between 500kbit/s and 2Mbit/s. France Telecom has been developing this technology for several years and has in particular been involved in standardisation work.
FT says that SDSL technology is suited to a variety of applications that generate large volumes of data to be transmitted in both downstream and upstream directions.
Symmetric data flows are efficient for data exchanges between information systems for applications such as distributed computing or collaborative working. Manufacturers can exchange production data with partners, for example, or R&D teams at different locations can share 3D documents or animated images in real time.
High-speed service also supports the development of so-called light PCs, enabling people to work using centralized desktop applications. Other possible uses of SDSL include interactive distance learning, telemaintenance or medical assistance from remote staff.
FT claims to be the only operator to offer high-speed SDSL technology on an extensive scale across France. The broad geographic coverage of the service will thus benefit an extremely large number of businesses in the country.