CityFibre commits to XGS-PON on FTTH networks

July 25, 2022

CityFibre says it will use XGS-PON to introduce symmetrical services up to 10 Gbps for its residential and business customers.

Stephen Hardy

UK fiber to the home (FTTH) network operator CityFibre says it will make XGS-PON its standard fiber access technology beginning April 2023. Calix and Nokia will supply the XGS-PON technology.

CityFibre says it will use XGS-PON to introduce symmetrical services up to 10 Gbps for its residential and business customers. The technology also will enable the support of more customers on each optical line terminal (OLT) port.

Calix and Nokia are longstanding broadband technology partners for CityFibre. Calix has supplied GPON equipment since 2018 (see "CityFibre to deploy Calix AXOS operating system across FTTP networks"), while Nokia has supported CityFibre’s service aggregation platform since 2016. Calix has already supported an XGS-PON upgrade pilot in alongside LambdaNetworks and Splice Group. CityFibre reports “near perfect optical testing results” as part of the pilot.

Nokia says its XGS-PON supply agreement with CityFibre runs 10 years and includes its Lightspan MF OLT family, XS-010X-Q optical network terminations, and 7220 IXR-D3L IP Aggregation Switch. Equipment shipments of will begin in the fourth quarter of this year. The company points out that it already has collaborated with CityFibre and the University of Glasgow on a trial of 25G PON as well (see "25G PON supports 5G holographic call in University of Glasgow testbed").

“CityFibre is committed to building a Full Fibre network that is ‘Better By Design,’ providing our partners and their customers with the fastest and most reliable services at the best value. By partnering with Calix and Nokia we now have two trusted and market-leading technology vendors underpinning a nationwide 10-Gbps XGS-PON technology deployment program,” commented John Franklin, chief technology and information officer at CityFibre.

“Our parallel deployment of a high-capacity national backbone to carry virtually unlimited traffic alongside this XGS-PON deployment program will deliver a highly efficient and adaptable network for the future. This in turn will enable our ISP partners to offer a differentiated range of services in full confidence that speed and service quality can be maintained as consumer and business bandwidth demand continues to rise,” Franklin concluded.

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About the Author

Stephen Hardy | Editorial Director and Associate Publisher, Lightwave

Stephen Hardy is editorial director and associate publisher of Lightwave and Broadband Technology Report, part of the Lighting & Technology Group at Endeavor Business Media. Stephen is responsible for establishing and executing editorial strategy across the both brands’ websites, email newsletters, events, and other information products. He has covered the fiber-optics space for more than 20 years, and communications and technology for more than 35 years. During his tenure, Lightwave has received awards from Folio: and the American Society of Business Press Editors (ASBPE) for editorial excellence. Prior to joining Lightwave in 1997, Stephen worked for Telecommunications magazine and the Journal of Electronic Defense.

Stephen has moderated panels at numerous events, including the Optica Executive Forum, ECOC, and SCTE Cable-Tec Expo. He also is program director for the Lightwave Innovation Reviews and the Diamond Technology Reviews.

He has written numerous articles in all aspects of optical communications and fiber-optic networks, including fiber to the home (FTTH), PON, optical components, DWDM, fiber cables, packet optical transport, optical transceivers, lasers, fiber optic testing, and more.

You can connect with Stephen on LinkedIn as well as Twitter.