Operators around the world have been rolling out high-speed Internet access networks since the mid-2000s.
Some used a network topology known as Active Ethernet Point-to-Point to deliver services from its central office directly
into subscribers' homes. Fiber termination was handled by a residential gateway provided by Advanced Digital Broadcast
inside a subscriber's home
Since 2007, Italian access providers Fastweb,[17] Telecom Italia, Vodafone, and Wind participated in an initiative
called Fiber for Italy, with the aim of creating a countrywide fiber-to-the-home network in Italy. By the end of
December 2010, the total number of fiber-to-the-home enabled homes had passed 2.5 million, with more than 348,000
subscribers.
Optical Distribution Networks
Direct Fiber
The simplest optical distribution network architecture is direct fiber: each fiber leaving the central office goes
to exactly one customer. Such networks can provide excellent bandwidth but are more costly due to the fiber and
central office machinery.
Shared Fiber
More commonly, each fiber leaving the central office is actually shared by many customers. It is not until such a
fiber gets relatively close to the customers that it is split into individual customer-specific fibers.
Active Optical Network (AON)
An active optical system uses electrically powered switching equipment, such as a router or a switch aggregator,
to manage signal distribution and direct signals to specific customers. This switch opens and closes in various ways
to direct the incoming and outgoing signals to the proper place. In such a system, a customer may have a dedicated
fiber running to his or her house. Active optical networks offer certain advantages.
Passive Optical Network (PON)
Passive Optical Network is not the same as AON as it does not have any electrically powered switching equipment.
PON makes use of fiber optic splitters for directing traffic signals of different wavelengths. The optical
splitters used in PON are capable of separating and collecting optical signals as they are transmitted through
the network. You will need electrically charged equipment only at the source of the signal and at the receiving
end of the signal.
Hybrid Fiber Coaxial (HFC)
Hybrid Fiber Coaxial (HFC) is a telecommunications industry term for a broadband network that combines optical
fiber and coaxial cable. It has been commonly employed globally by cable television operators since the early 1990s.
The fiber optic network extends from the cable operators' master headend, sometimes to regional headends, and
out to a neighborhood's hubsite, and finally to a coaxial cable node which serves anywhere from 25 to 2000 homes.
BharatNet
India is second largest market in world for mobiles after China. India has also embarked world’s largest project
of laying Optic fibre across India to connect all unconnected. This project is called Bharat Net.
BharatNet is a task of national significance to build up, by 2017, an exceptionally adaptable system framework
available on a non-biased premise, to give on request, reasonable broadband network of 2 Mbps to 20 Mbps for all
families and on request ability to all establishments, to understand the vision of Digital India, in organization
with States and the private area.
