Kansas CLEC awards Fiber-to-the-Home contract to Optical Solutions Inc.
Optical Solutions Inc. today announced that it has been awarded a contract from Nex-Tech to overbuild the Northwestern Kansas town of Osborne with a direct fiber connection that will extend to hundreds of homes and small businesses.
Nex-Tech, a competitive local exchange carrier (CLEC) and a wholly owned subsidiary of Lenora, Kan.-based Rural Telephone Service Co., will operate the new fiber network.
Nex-Tech elected to deploy Optical Solution's FiberPath 400 system, which is capable of delivering high-speed Internet access, hundreds of analog and digital television channels, and multiple phone lines to each subscriber, claims the company. HunTel Engineering of Blair, NB, is overseeing the deployment.
"We are very excited about our newest overbuild in Osborne," asserts Larry Sevier, chief executive officer and general manager of Nex-Tech and Rural Telephone Service Co. "Every community we've entered has embraced our fiber-to-the-home service wholeheartedly--with take rates as high as 95 percent--so we're confident we're doing the right thing. "
The FiberPath 400 architecture is based on a passive optical network, or PON, which is the most economic and labor-efficient method for delivering triple-play services in the last mile, says the company. FiberPath's PON network is enabled by the FiberDrive headend unit, which is stationed at the service provider's central office (CO), and the FiberPoint customer premise node, which attaches to the exterior of a subscriber premise.
"It is just a short matter of time before true high-speed broadband services and one-stop shopping becomes standard in the telecom industry," contends Rick Plugge, president of HunTel Engineering. "Today we're seeing falling prices on fiber, splicing, equipment, and labor, which makes fiber-to-the-home a more viable solution than ever before."
For more information about Optical Solutions Inc. (Minneapolis, MN), visit the company's Web site at www.opticalsolutions.com.