Go for automatic - physical-layer management - Technology Information

Communications News, Oct, 1999 by A. Panessidi

At its most cutting edge, automated cross-connect switch technology can be used to assist telecommunications providers grappling with the challenges of serving the emerging market for high-speed broadband digital subscriber line (DSL) services. By permitting electronic testing, provisioning, and management of DSL lines, these switches can free carriers from the time and expense needed to manually connect test equipment and hook individual lines into DSL access multiplexers (DSLAMs) or other devices.

The advantages of physical-layer management are even more dramatic for DSL deployment. With analysts projecting more than one million lines by 2001, major telcos are faced with the prospect of an unprecedented workload to meet this demand. For the competitive local exchange carriers (CLECs) who are expected to deliver the bulk of the DSL services, this is vastly complicated by their peculiar relationship with the incumbent local exchange carriers (ILECs) who control the existing telecommunications infrastructure.

Since each copper wire must be tested prior to deployment to ensure proper service delivery, CLECs are paying ILECs $15 to $40 per line per month for loop qualification. CLECs are also faced with a problem in the DSL deployment process because of the need to install a DSLAM multiplexer at or near the ILEC's central office through a co-location arrangement. If the ILEC requires that its technicians make the changes, it can take several days and additional charges. If the CLEC itself is granted access to the co-location cage, it still requires an expensive truck roll. These factors make it difficult for CLECs to price DSL services competitively.

Automated switching technology solves the problem by placing the switch at the ILEC's central office between the main distribution frame and the DSLAM. Testing, deployment, and maintenance then can be performed without manual intervention. In the case of CLECs, this allows CLEC equipment located within the co-location cage to be managed remotely, avoids delays caused by waiting for service from the ILEC, eliminates recurring charges when entering the co-location cage, and minimizes the need for on-site personnel. It also provides fallback switching by allowing the network operator to remotely cross-connect from a failed DSLAM card to a spare card.

One firm currently benefiting from these advances in physical-layer management technology is Tampa Electric Company (TECO), which is using the new Switchex/ DVS switch from NHC Communications, Inc. to manage line provisioning and subscriber moves, adds, and changes for remote sites. Like all power utilities, TECO has widely dispersed remote offices requiring technicians to schedule expensive truck-roll time when they need to be serviced. Automated switching eliminates that process altogether.

TECO officials estimate they will incur a formidable saving in scheduled man-hours per year per site by managing their remote phone network from the central office. Multiply that by 26 sites, and you come up with substantial savings in time and labor that could not be achieved any other way.