Nortel's Optical Ethernet Deployed To Deliver 'Triple Play' Cable Services

Frankfurt, Germany - Unity Media GmbH has deployed a Nortel Optical Ethernet network to support 'triple play' cable services such as VoIP, video-on-demand, and Internet. The recently formed German cable operator Unity Media is the proprietor of established cable network operators ish and iesy.

The Unity Media network consolidates the subscriber services of cable network operators ish and iesy and serves more than five million customers in Germany's North Rhine-Westphalia and Hessen regions. Nortel's Optical Ethernet solution is helping Unity Media to drive down operational costs and create new revenue by enhancing its service portfolio and expanding its service area.

"Nortel enabled us to successfully unite the ish and iesy networks to create Europe's largest interconnected cable network," said Colin Buechner, senior vice president Network Operations and Technology, Unity Media. "Now we can deliver a full range of entertainment and multi-media services, including digital TV, video-on-demand, Internet and telephony, into more homes from a single source. We chose Nortel because of its leadership and proven experience in delivering Optical Ethernet networks on time. These strengths have been critical in helping us meet the new capacity requirements created by the merger of ish and iesy in a very tight timeframe."

Unity Media's Optical Ethernet network was planned, implemented and put into commercial operation in just six weeks.

"By consolidating the Ethernet transport of iesy and ish subscriber services over a single multiservice optical backbone, we were able to satisfy Unity Media's immediate capacity needs," said Peter Newcombe, president Carrier Networks, Nortel. "The newly deployed network also has room for future growth as Unity Media adds new services and subscribers."

The Nortel solution deployed for Unity Media provides multiple Gigabit Ethernet interfaces to support video transport and Internet data and is based on Nortel's Optical Metro 5000 product. The network solution makes use of the Gigabit Ethernet Muxponder card that permits 10 x Gigabit Ethernet service on a single 10 Gbps wavelength. This solution maximises use of each wavelength capacity, minimises the initial cost of deployment, and enables network and service expansion. The additional ability to provide transparent connectivity for native 10 Gigabit Ethernet LAN and WAN service traffic provides further network scalability and efficiency.

SOURCE: Unity Media