Shenzhen to become a 'Gigaband City' through China Telecom and Huawei collaboration

Through a cooperation framework agreement, China Telecom and Huawei plan to deliver gigabit connectivity to Shenzhen, China, to make it a "Gigaband City." The effort will deliver 1-Gbps connectivity through fiber-optic networks to drive economic and social development, transforming Shenzhen into a benchmark smart city.

The rapid urbanization spurred by population growth places enormous pressure on cities' public transportation, healthcare, waste management, and power grid systems. Several cities have sought to become "smart cities" to keep pace with expectations for high-quality services and more efficient systems that ensure better safety and sustainability for the future. These smart cities promise to deliver ubiquitous high-definition surveillance, large-capacity distributed cloud data centers, real-time HD telemedicine, and online education opportunities – all requiring higher-speed connectivity.

China Telecom and Huawei say that Shenzhen is the first city in China to propose a "Gigaband City" approach through large-scale deployment of next-generation optical line terminals and next-generation passive optical networks (NG-PONs) to deliver the necessary 1 Gbps coverage for communities and access to more than 900,000 homes. China Telecom and Huawei have partnered to deploy this capability over the next five years.

"China Telecom is dedicated to accelerating Shenzhen's broadband network capabilities and, together with Huawei, we aim to rapidly transform into an ultra-fast landscape," says Li Pengfel, general manager of China Telecom. "This will enable Shenzhen to keep pace with consumer demand for new Internet applications, such as ultra-broadband video, VR [virtual reality] and AR, gigaband campus and smart homes. We believe a Gigaband city will also foster digital economy innovation in Shenzhen and establish Shenzhen as an oasis for inventors."

In addition to improved services for residence, the collaborators also will provide expand services to governments and enterprises via passive optical LANs, "gigaband hotels" and "Optical + Cloud" applications. Through this collaboration, China Telecom and Huawei plan to jointly define standards for a gigaband city, providing guidance and reference for this new emerging space.

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