Announcing First Products To Achieve Broadband Forum G-PON ONU Certification

Seven products have now passed the new Broadband Forum G-PON ONU Certification Program and achieved full Certification, speeding the arrival of superfast broadband on a global scale

News Highlights:

-- Seven products from seven vendors have achieved certification against the Broadband Forum's G-PON ONU Certification Program, with more expected shortly

-- Enrollment in the certification program is now open(1) to G-PON ONU products with Ethernet interfaces and is based on the Broadband Forum's OD-247 test plan.  It tests conformance to TR-156 using OMCI as defined in the ITU G.988, which are the most critical standards to interoperable implementations  

-- Global service providers and vendors alike applaud the certification program and what it means to the industry

GENEVA, Oct. 26, 2011 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ --- The world's first certified G-PON products were announced today at ITU Telecom World in Geneva. This is a major milestone in expanding the deployment of high speed fiber broadband, ensuring the support of a host of new multi-play, bandwidth-hungry services and devices coming online. The seven vendors whose products have achieved the first G-PON certifications are: Alcatel-Lucent, Broadlight, Cambridge Industries Group, Huawei, PMC-Sierra, PT Inovacao and Tecom.  The Global Registry of certified products is available on the Broadband Forum website at: www.broadband-forum.org/CertifiedG-PON.

The Broadband Forum G-PON Certification Program is an industry first. It verifies the conformance of G-PON products and their adherence to the ITU-T G-PON standard and to Broadband Forum specifications.  This paves the way for interoperability, giving service providers greater scope to expand their high speed broadband services cost-effectively.  It provides vendors with the opportunity to test once and use their certification globally, saving testing cost and time as they compete in RFPs for business.

Robin Mersh, CEO of Broadband Forum, said:  "We are delighted that the first round of testing has resulted in success for seven companies and a wide range of G-PON products, with more to follow. This robust compliance certification program is the bedrock on which to expedite interoperability and fiber market penetration. It will ensure strong future network development for superfast broadband. We have today taken an important step for vendors and for their service provider customers."

As G-PON becomes increasingly the choice for high bandwidth and multiple broadband services, manufacturers and service providers are already looking beyond the current generation to new architectures with XG-PON and more.  The advent of certification will provide the breakthrough step in accelerating deployment now and creating the platform for future-proof development in new fiber networks.

Malcolm Johnson, Director, Telecommunication Standardization Bureau, ITU, commented: "We welcome and applaud BBF's G-PON certification programme. Conformity to ITU's internationally agreed standards will foster an environment where service providers can pick and choose equipment from a variety of vendors, and will greatly increase the probability of interoperability. This will increase competition and bring down costs... something especially important in developing countries."

Service providers express their support and strong backing of the Broadband Forum Certification Program

Kevin Foster CEng. FIET, Head of Access Design CoE, Access Platform, BT Innovate & Design

"We strongly support this BBF certification work because it will improve the quality and functionality of G-PON ONU products."

Gavin Young, Head of Strategy & Planning, Technology Strategy & Architecture, Cable & Wireless Worldwide
"Cable & Wireless Worldwide welcomes the Broadband Forum G-PON certification programme.  G-PON interoperability and assured performance levels will be key to optimising the choice of G-PON equipment for use in different types of premises and for different market sectors.  It will help to give greater choice to service providers as they seek to balance functionality and cost for different deployment scenarios."

Wei Leping, speaking on behalf of China Telecom
"G-PON interoperability is critical for mass deployment in the Chinese market and China is already the largest and fastest growing market for broadband. The G-PON Certification will certainly enable us to accelerate the widespread availability of faster broadband. With the Chinese market moving towards an estimated 250 million subscriber lines by 2015 and a household penetration of 50%, China Telecom sees G-PON and the advent of certified G-PON products as an important step in making this a reality."

Alain Maloberti, SVP Network Architecture and Design of France Telecom Orange
"This Broadband Forum certification is a key element for the success of G-PON interoperability. Our expectation is that this will allow next generation systems to come to the market promptly and with interoperability from day one. It will allow us to reduce dramatically the amount of specific testing needed before we deploy new equipment in our network."

Chris Mayer, Vice President, Corporate Technology, Systems Integration and Testing, Verizon
"The Broadband Forum G-PON Certification program will provide assurance that technologies meet industry specifications through an independent testing service.  Certification will demonstrate that businesses are forming the correct partnerships to deliver an industry accepted original equipment manufacturer (OEM) service. Consistency in offerings and equipment lessen the impact of non-standard equipment causing unnecessary downtime."

Certified product vendors also applaud their certification success:

Dave Geary, President of the Wireline Division at Alcatel-Lucent
"We are helping service providers in every geography bring better broadband service to more people, as quickly as possible. Fiber build-outs are essential to this process, and everyone involved - service providers and vendors alike - need the assurance that the equipment we are deploying will interoperate smoothly and seamlessly, every time. We are very pleased to have received Broadband Forum's Broadband Suite 5.0 certification. This gives Alcatel-Lucent and our customers the confidence we need to connect more people in more places."

Didi Ivancovsky, VP Carriers Strategy and Founder of BroadLight
"The Broadband Forum Certification Program will have a significant effect on the progress of G-PON technology; as pioneers of the ITU PON commercial silicon products, BroadLight is excited to see the further advancement of G-PON's future technology footprints.  Over the course of the past several years, BroadLight has had extensive involvement in all of the Interoperability related events and with the launch of the certification program, we are happy to witness the culmination of these efforts positively materialize."

Dr. Gerry Wong, Chairman and CEO, Cambridge Industries Group
"As a leading ODM supplier focused on broadband customer premise equipment (CPE) for next generation optical networks, CIG has a broad G-PON CPE portfolio for single family, business and multi-dwelling ONTs and we rely on standards and interoperability to grow the market.  Strong standards coupled with a robust compliance & interoperability program managed by an independent body with global credibility allows CIG to offer our customers G-PON ONT products that will work across multiple OLT platforms.  The Broadband Forum Certification Program provides a springboard for the next phase of growth and anticipated demand for G-PON CPE/ONT. CIG is proud to be one of the first certified participants."  

You Yiyong, President of Huawei's Access Network Product Line
"Huawei fully supports the Broadband Forum's G-PON certification program and we are pleased to be among the first companies to achieve product certification. The process of testing and certifying products gives added confidence for vendors, service providers and users. It will lead to wider deployment of this key technology that has the potential to deliver significant further improvement in broadband services."

Ofer Bar-Or, VP&GM Fiber to the Home Division, PMC-Sierra
"The BBF.247 certification program is a key milestone in G-PON industry interoperability and demonstrates solution maturity. As a leading G-PON supplier with highly interoperable and flexible G-PON solutions deployed worldwide, it was important for PMC to be among the first group of vendors to achieve certification."

Michael Kwan, CEO of Tecom
"Tecom's OB1004 G-PON Mini ONT is fully compliant with Broadband Forum's standard requirements and we believe through Broadband Forum's conformance test program, Tecom ensures our OB1004 G-PON Mini ONT meets the product demand from any operators worldwide."

Enrollment in the certification program is now open to all Broadband Forum members.  Additional test suites will be added over time included OLT and XG-PON1 certification options.  For more information check out www.broadband-forum.org.

For further information please contact Brian Dolby on +44 (0) 7899 914168 or Sheila Lashford on +44 (0) 7986 514240 or by email to [email protected] or [email protected]

About the Broadband Forum
Broadband Forum, a non-profit industry organization, is focused on engineering smarter and faster broadband connections. Our work defines best practices for global networks, enables service and content delivery, establishes technology migration strategies, engineers critical device & service management tools, and is key to redefining broadband.  Our technical reports and free white papers can be found at www.broadband-forum.org.

(1) Broadband Forum Certification Program is open to Broadband Forum members only.  For information, go to http://www.broadband-forum.org/about/join.php

SOURCE Broadband Forum