Broadband technology developer Sckipio said today that it has successfully demonstrated the ability of G.fast technology to support speeds up to 500 Mbps for 200 meters over traditional copper phone wiring. Alternatively the technology can support speeds of up to 200 Mbps over 400 meters.
Sckipio noted in a press release that this represents a doubling of speeds over what is specified in the standard adopted by the International Telecommunications Union. Until now manufacturers have targeted G.fast speeds of 500 Mbps over a distance of 100 meters.
“We tuned our technology to allow telcos to reach more customers with higher performance from farther away,” said Sckipio CEO David Baum in the press release.
200 Mbps G.fast Broadband
The ability to deliver high-speed broadband over copper over a distance of 400 meters would minimize how deep into its access network a telco would have to bring fiber, thereby helping to minimize broadband deployment costs while also enabling telcos to compete more effectively with cable companies. The cablecos currently have an advantage because the hybrid fiber coax infrastructure most of them have deployed can support higher speeds than the DSL infrastructure that telcos have deployed.
Sckipio’s news comes just days after the FCC adopted a new definition of broadband at 25 Mbps for purposes of an annual report on broadband deployment.
The FCC also hopes to make broadband available to all Americans through the Connect America Fund, which will help pay some deployment costs in rural areas. The target speed for the CAF program has been set at just 10 Mbps, but FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler said 10 Mbps is “the minimum we support because we expect more.”
Telcos making new broadband deployments through that program or otherwise will want to deliver the highest speeds they can afford to deploy.
