[advertise]广告[/advertise]February 2 2010, It is just reported that China Telecom will finish fiber access network upgrade in major cities in 3 to 5 years to bring 20Mbps bandwidth to all subscribers in big cities.
This fiber access network will be mainly a FTTB network, only in some developed areas, FTTH will become available. China Telecom will guarantee fiber connected to all commercial buildings and new residential buildings in major cities. For residential subscribers, their bandwidth will be 8Mbps to 20Mbps。In rural areas, China Telecom will connect fiber to each village in eastern China. In western China, 80% villages will have fiber connection. Based on this connection, China Telecom will provide 4Mbps bandwidth.
Compared to today’s popular 1M or 2M bandwidth service, the new 20Mbps bandwidth service is really a big leap. This bandwidth will provide great flexibility for China Telecom’s new services including IPTV. China’s government just turned on green light for triple play. China Telecom’s new 20Mbps plan should aim at this policy change.
Before today’s report, China Telecom already made some FTTx trial networks, especially in Shanghai and Wuhan. Last year, Shanghai Telecom announced to invest 6billion RMB to build fiber access network. Their aim is to realize 100M to each home, 1000M to each building. In year 2011, Shanghai will have 3million homes connected to 100Mbps bandwidth. For China’s optical vally, Wuhan also announced their FTTx project. Late August, Wuhan Telecom became the first service provider to provide 20Mbps residential bandwidth service.
Not only, China Telecom, China Unicom and China Mobile also have their ambitious FTTx plan. For fiber optics industry, it is really exciting news.