How will Europe embrace the co-existence of cable and fiber?
Within the European telecoms industry, cable operators are confronted with an increasingly competitive landscape.
Alan Breznick, Cable/Video Practice Leader, Light Reading, examines the market disruptors that threaten the future success of existing cable business models, and the options open to cablecos to survive.
Facing growing competitive threats from all-fiber providers, European cable operators are in a quandary right now. Should they forge ahead with their legacy hybrid fiber-coax (HFC) architecture and next-generation versions of DOCSIS technology? Or should they junk HFC and DOCSIS and embrace all-fiber networks and next-gen versions of PON technology? Or should they cobble together some combination of the two approaches?
There are no easy answers to these questions. Yet they must be tackled as European cablecos grapple with their ever-loosening grip on the continent’s broadband market. Operators must find ways to maintain and even bolster their competitive position if they wish to survive and thrive for many more years to come.
Fortunately for cablecos, there are numerous steps they can take. These steps include: adopting enhanced versions of DOCSIS 3.1, rolling out DOCSIS 4.0, building fiber extensions to their existing HFC plant, replacing their GFC networks with all-fiber lines, deploying distributed access architecture (DAA) technology, carrying out spectrum mid-splits and high-splits, and leveraging network virtualization, automation, artificial intelligence (AI) and other new technologies.
While few, if any, European operators are looking to pursue all these options at the same time, most are examining multiple technologies, platforms, and services as they search for the magic formula that could enable their business to prosper in an intensely competitive environment over the next decade. As a result, they are scrambling to create proofs-of-concept, conduct lab tests, run field trials, deploy new equipment, develop fresh business models, and plan their next moves.
Yet the clock is ticking for cablecos, as fiber, fixed wireless and mobile providers continue to make impressive strides in the European broadband market and lure cable’s customers away. Operators also face the prospect of shelling out huge sums of capital to upgrade their legacy networks and keep them competitive at a time when some governments are subsidizing fiber builds by new players.
So, what does the future hold for European cable? Which network upgrade strategies will prove successful? How well can cablecos keep up with the fiber rollouts of such aggressive telco rivals as BT, Orange, Deutsche Telekom, and Telefonica?
These are the questions that we will examine in Light Reading’s Cable Next-Gen Europe 2024 digital symposium on Tuesday, 4 June.
Returning by popular demand for the seventh consecutive year, Cable Next-Gen Europe is a free, three-hour digital event that will examine how the European broadband landscape is rapidly changing as cable operators, fiber providers, wireless operators and other broadband players develop and deploy next-gen access technologies.
Specifically, the symposium will focus on the European cable industry’s latest moves with DOCSIS 3.1, DOCSIS 4.0, fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP), XCS-PON, DAA, spectrum mid-splits and high-splits, network virtualization, artificial intelligence, network automation, machine learning and other new technologies, platforms, and services.