Along with advances in optoelectronics, fiber technology has quietly enabled much of what we take for granted today, such as the Internet, high speed video and even mobile networks, all of which rely heavily on fiber backbones to ensure high quality of service. Fiber technology enables significantly lower-cost, higher capacity bandwidth at much greater distances than other media, such as coax, microwave and satellite, ever could.
Before fiber technology, bandwidth was scarce and expensive. All kinds of schemes, such as robbed bit signaling and bit compression multiplexing, were used to try to squeeze out as much bandwidth as possible from the previous backbone network technologies. Ongoing improvements in fiber optics continue to lower what is commonly referred to as the “cost per bit per kilometer” -- significantly reducing bandwidth costs to the point that all of the broadband services we have today could be delivered cost-effectively.
We at CommScope are very proud of the role we have played in bringing fiber optics to the telecommunications network: whether providing next generation wide-band multimode fiber in data centers, high density optical distribution frames for fiber-to-the-home, or fiber-to-the-antenna solutions, we continue to generate innovative solutions for our customers that are based on optical fiber technology. We've made it much easier to connect to the fiber superhighway.
At 50 years old, is fiber looking for early retirement? Not by a long shot! Innovation continues in core fiber technology and connectivity, and we look forward to developing new fiber-based innovations to keep ahead of the global need for more bandwidth.