Telco Wars Edition 5: Racing to 1.6Tb Backbones & Navigating Texas’s Fiber Boom
?? Welcome back Telco Gang! ??
Greetings and a warm welcome to Edition 5 of Telco Wars! I am thrilled to have you join us as we navigate through the ever-evolving and exhilarating world of telecommunications.
As we dive into this week’s discussions, I invite you to reflect, engage, and share your invaluable perspectives and experiences. Your thoughts and contributions are the catalysts that fuel the continuous growth and refinement of our telecom community.
Let's get to it!
The Journey to 1.6Tb Backbones
In the ceaseless endeavor to drive telecommunications to unprecedented peaks, industry leaders and innovators are pushing boundaries to reach the heralded 1.6Tb backbone. Spearheading this technological conquest is Ciena with its groundbreaking WaveLogic AI solutions. I have not heard of anyone else driving innovation to 1.6Tb backbones (yet that is). I suspect Nokia will be the next vendor to announce solutions to provide 1.6Tb line speed rates.
While this is the plan for the future upgrade of my network backbone, I still see the majority of enterprises still operating at 1G/10G connection speeds. My existing Juniper backbone is built with a 400G backbone where utilization remains relativity low. I think it might be a while before enterprises really need this amount of capacity. I do however see on the Telco side where 1.6Tb is a requirement as I see Hyperscalers and Big Tech ordering 100G Wave/IP circuits like candy.
With that being said, I still see many ISPs that have thousands of customers with single 10G upstream links. I am a firm believer of always going for the higher capacity links even if you don't need them just yet, but I do see where ISP's need to be cautious of opex and grow as needed. What I have been doing and I think everyone should be doing is going with higher rate port speeds but with lower bandwidth commits that allow for bursting. This way you get the cost savings + the ability to use more bandwidth as needed. (i.e 100G port w/ 10G commit & 95% percentile bursting). Pay as you go model.
The Texas Fiber Paradox: Saturation or Opportunity?
This week while in Dallas i engaged with telecom moguls over the ISP industry oversaturation across Texas. Competition is increasing every day as new and existing players are quickly building and expanding their fiber networks. A pervasive question dominated— to enter a possibly oversaturated market or pivot to untapped territories? The consensus underscores a pivotal strategy: compete vigorously and captivate customers, irrespective of existing providers.
I am a firm believer to maintain a competitive edge and keep customers, ISPs need to accentuate unique selling propositions, innovate service offerings, and develop out of the box customer-centric solutions Staying complacent is not an option. On the flip side I know how hard it is to go up against the big boys. I do it every day.
As I asked Telecom leaders whether the existence of new or existing providers steered their decision to enter a market, the answer was a big fat NO. The response was that instead of allowing the competitors to push you out of a market, you need to be focused on competing and winning your 40% marketshare.
I am also guilty of seeing a new provider enter my area (Vexus, VTX, etc) and quickly deciding to go deploy in another area. Perhaps I need to buck up and be prepared to provide more value than the other service offerings. Problem is doing this requires having some deep pockets and a great engineering team. Something not all smaller providers have. I am fortunate in this area.
I posted about this earlier this week and received feedback on how its easy for the bigger players to say this yet they have no real clue how to compete. Perhaps it's just a capital thing. There is some truth here i think. What are your thoughts?
I am taking the approach of not worrying about what the competition is doing. I am going to enter markets where I feel I have the ability to win marketshare regardless of who is there. I will stay focused on competing and providing more value than the next guy. I just need to ensure to surround myself with talented people (hopefully smarter than me) and ensure we focus on the customer and providing kick ass services that speak for themselves. The ISP game is rough but I wont let fear or decisiveness dictate where I build network to provide value to existing and new clients of mine. I will be fearless in the pursuit of being a top tier ISP across Texas. Visit us at www.gigabitfiber.com for more information.
Preventing Network Outages: Locates! Locates! Locates!
领英推荐
This week I grappled with numerous network outages, predominantly instigated by local contractors inadvertently damaging fiber optic lines during underground drilling. This underscores the critical necessity of securing 811 Locates to comprehend the utilities lurking underground before commencing any excavation, mitigating unwarranted disruptions.
The photo above shows a local boring crew hitting and chewing up a backbone fiber all because they failed to do the proper locates prior to their build. This wasn't my fiber, but I would be so pissed it if was!
I recently stood up a boring rig, and I myself also have to be careful when it comes to HDD. Sometimes I get too eager to just want to go build, and I dont consider the potential consequences when I rush the job. I need to do a better job of this.
During our last bore (500ft), we did hit the neighbors water line and crushed the SOB. Water spewing all over the damn place. To my defense this was on the load side of the line, and the line was not marked by 811. Im sure this wont be the last time we hit a line, but its better to take your time and ensure you know whats in the ground prior to boring underground. The last thing you want is to hit/break something big and now your ass is on the hot seat. Lesson learned.
Connecting at WISPA 2023
As WISPA 2023 draws nearer, the anticipation surges. Gigabit Fiber is primed to immerse in enriching dialogues, forge new alliances, and explore collaborative vistas in the ISP domain. We extend a warm invitation to prospective customers and vendors to initiate conversations and arrange meetings. Let’s leverage this platform to cultivate meaningful connections, exchange insights, and synergize efforts to shape the future of telecommunications.
Worse case lets schedule some time to chat and have some drinks while we are at it. I am hoping to meet other ISP operators and trade war stories (Telco Wars). I can be reached at [email protected] for meeting schedules. Should be fun conference!
Outage of the Week
Luckily this week I did not cause any network outages surprisingly. But this weeks award yet again goes to ATT for an outage that lasted 24+ hours. I need to really just get a damn diverse circuit from them cause this is somewhat routine for ATT circuits (in my experience at least). I have been too busy to get some diversity, but that is for sure no excuse. (cmon alex concentrate)
It turned out that a Spectrum contractor in Dallas that was installing a utility pole, and hit an ATT underground fiber causing my outage. This is what steered me to write this weeks section on utility locates. Luckily everything is back up and running (for now). Make sure you have diversity EVERYWHERE.
Telco Wars Call to Action:
Thanks for taking the time to read this weeks newsletter, and may the waves of innovation and insight propel us all towards a more connected and enlightened future.
Happy Routing!
Alex Ochoa
Founder
Telco Wars
Want to collaborate on a new project? Need some consulting? Lets' connect! ?? [email protected]
iBridge Cloud Technologies Inc.
1 年Really love the article thank you for the insight. Here in Cal. we have less issues with AT&T then say ZxxO. Everyone loves diversity and redundancy in the end it all comes down to cost. We have had outages that should not have happened but for whatever reason several bad things happened in several bad places all at once. I attached a little gift of the aftermath of a bore incident. The leap to 100G is happening everywhere. For our small network were almost half way through upgrading or replacing our transport long haul connections. Several clients are using more than 4Gb of DIA plus transport upgrading is the responsible thing to do.
Edition 5 of Telco Wars sounds like an exciting journey through the telecom landscape! We appreciate your dedication to keeping us informed about the latest developments in telecommunications. The topics you've covered are both insightful and relevant to the industry. We'll definitely check it out and engage in the discussions. Keep up the great work!
Network Solutions Architect
1 年Awesome post Alex! I do agree on having the backbone to support high bandwidth even if the traffic is not there yet. Planning for growth is better than saving a few bucks and having to re-architecture everything because of it. Keep up the great work brother!
Next Trend Realty LLC./wwwHar.com/Chester-Swanson/agent_cbswan
1 年Thanks for Sharing.