NeoPhotonics offers PON OLT optical transceivers with embedded OTDR functions

NeoPhotonics Corp. (NYSE: NPTN) has announced a GPON optical line terminal (OLT) SFP transceiver with embedded optical time-domain reflectometer (eOTDR) functions.

The company says it developed the eOTDR OLT optical transceiver “in collaboration with leading broadband access network equipment manufacturers.” Alcatel-Lucent recently announced just such a capability for its PON OLTs (see “Alcatel-Lucent adds integrated OTDR capabilities to PON offering”). A question to NeoPhotonics regarding whether the two announcement s are related had not been answered by the time this article was posted. We’ll expand this report as more information becomes available.

“We are excited to introduce our eOTDR OLT SFP, which is designed to enable our customers to provide an integrated fiber monitoring solution instead of the current standalone test and measurement approach,” said Tim Jenks, chairman and CEO of NeoPhotonics. “The eOTDR represents another example of innovative NeoPhotonics solutions designed to lower the overall cost of FTTH network rollout and operation.”

The integrated OTDR function is designed to streamline the deployment and management of fiber to the home (FTTH) networks. The transceiver collects OTDR data, then feeds this data to a PON management system for processing.

The eOTDR transceiver is NeoPhotonics’ second FTTH-related technology announcement in the past month. The company unveiled a Mode Coupling Receiver (MCR) for OLTs at the European Conference on Optical Communications (ECOC) in Amsterdam.

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