DENVER – Seeking to get a leg up on the future, Comcast intends to start testing the "operational readiness" of its new next-generation cable architecture in the next couple of months, bringing the MSO another step closer to actual deployment.
Speaking at a Light Reading conference on cable next-gen broadband strategies in Denver last week, Jorge Salinger, vice-president of access architecture for Comcast, said the MSO is aiming to test its denser, more efficient Converged Multiservice Access Platform (CMAP) by mid-year. He said the trial will focus on ensuring that Comcast’s underlying operations are up to speed as it and other major North American and European MSOs prepare for more extensive CMAP field tests, pilot launches, and, eventually, full-fledged deployments in the next year or two. Cable trials of CMAP equipment will follow later this year and next.
Salinger said the plant operational trials will seek to "bring reality to the day-to-day life" of CMAP. He said that’s important because it’s becoming clear that cable operators will need many new tools to support such key operations support systems (OSS) elements as network management, monitoring, fault detection, and trouble-ticketing under the emerging CMAP regime.
"There are more tools that will change than will not change," Salinger said. "There’s a phenomenal amount of work that needs to be done to prepare for deployment."
These operational changes, in turn, will have a major impact on how cable engineers perform their jobs and work with each other. Currently, cable video and broadband engineers tend to work in separate silos and sometimes don’t even know each other. Under CMAP, these two separate silos will come together because the next-gen architecture will combine them so that they operate on the same control plane.
Comcast and its growing lineup of partners are developing the new CMAP architecture as the cable industry scrambles to shift to an all-IP infrastructure that will add video to the IP mix for the first time. To aid in that transition, CMAP promises to improve port densities significantly by merging the traditional functions of the cable modem termination system (CMTS) and the edge QAM, which are now housed in separate devices.
Besides reducing equipment and other capital costs, CMAP aims to cut the required headend space by 50% while providing four times the capacity. Salinger predicts that CMAP will also consume 60% less power, as well as require less cooling. “These reasons alone will justify the need for the CMAP," he said.
Of course, there’s still a long road ahead. Salinger said Comcast and its partners don’t expect hardware vendors to start shipping CMAP equipment for initial lab trials until mid-year, with field trials expected to start in late 2011 and early 2012. He said the first commercial deployments could begin sometime next year.
Time Warner Cable, the second biggest MSO in the U.S., is conspicuously absent from that list. But Salinger said Time Warner, which is developing a similar initiative on its own, is working with Comcast to ensure that both companies are on the same page. He said the CMAP group is having "extensive discussions with Time Warner Cable to make sure we have common requirements."
Alan Breznick is a Toronto-based senior analyst at Heavy Reading, part of the Light Reading Communications Network.
