If someone wants to surf web pages, download MP3s, share photographs or watch streaming video, then the currently offered broadband services are good enough. But, this is going to change – or at least that’s what is being predicted.
Here are some interesting statistics from Cisco’s Visual Networking Index:
• Global IP traffic will quadruple from 2009 to 2014
• Video-on-demand (VoD) traffic will double every two and a half years through 2014
• Consumer IPTV and CATV traffic will grow at a 33% CAGR between 2009 and 2014
• For the first time since 2000, P2P traffic will not be the largest type of Internet traffic
• Advanced internet video (3D and HD) will increase twenty-three fold between 2009 and 2014; by 2014, 3D and HD internet video will comprise 46 percent of consumer internet video traffic
Well it sounds great, but will these predictions come true? As the old cliché goes, you need two to tango, and in our case the industry needs content and content transportation.
Content wise, it seems like the rate at which 3D content is produced and distributed over the internet is relatively slow. Despite the fact that most of the next-gen TV (e.g., LED) vendors have 3D capable sets and some of newest smartphones are 3D capable, the content is not easily achieved.
Is this related to the broadband services offered today? Or is it the nationwide IP traffic distribution and transportation networks that aren’t capable of delivering? These are good questions which are yet to be addressed.
The access part of the network is well handled with solutions like FTTH. FTTH-capable networks are the bulldozers that are capable of pushing forward next-gen access, and all of the above visions and more are easily achieved with this superfast technology.
But the bottleneck is at the higher level layers – aggregation and transport towards the core. It’s not easy to dimension and plan highly scalable networks with the steep increase in network end points. FTTH deployment should always be accompanied by a very flexible aggregation layer, one with future-proof hardware and robust bandwidth management (to shape traffic). This layer should also be accompanied by a powerful and very scalable transport layer that utilizes technologies like WDM and OTN.
None of this is of interest to the new big screen 3D/HD LED TV owners. As far as they’re concerned, someone should call a plumber, and it had better be an IP plumber.
Ariel Caner
Product Marketing Manager
Network Solutions Division