ICC News: In the middle of this month, Vuma, South Africa’s largest fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) provider, announced that through its latest cooperation with Huawei, it will integrate next-generation fiber optic technology and innovation into the South African market.
As the next-generation PON technology defined by ITU-T, 50G PON effectively supports 10Gbps Everywhere. It provides high-density symmetrical 50G PON to meet the increasing bandwidth demands in future campus, industrial interconnection, enterprise, and home scenarios. It integrates GPON, 10G PON, and 50G PON into one port, allowing services to be upgraded on demand.
Through this partnership, Vuma is launching 50G PON capabilities, significantly higher than the existing 2.5Gbps capabilities today. Following the testing phase, deploying this first-to-market technology will enable Vuma customers to access higher upload and download fiber broadband speeds over the provider’s FTTH network, meeting growing consumer demand for faster, higher capacity, and more stable connections. Francois Swart, CTO of Vuma, said: “Vuma’s investment in testing and rolling out new Huawei PON technology is future-proof, which will enable us to achieve greater capacity in the last mile fiber and increase speed according to customer requirements – approximately 20 times faster than the capacity currently deployed.”
At the “Huawei Eco-Connect Sub-Saharan Africa 2023” launch event, Richard Jin, President of Huawei’s Optical Business Product Line, delivered a keynote speech, mentioning Huawei’s vision for the region, enabling everyone to access truly high-speed connections.
Richard Jin said: “Fibre-optic broadband will greatly promote innovation and employment in the country. However, the fixed broadband (FBB) penetration rate in most African countries is much lower than the global average. This is both a challenge and an opportunity.”
Kim Jin, Vice President of Huawei’s Optical Business Product Line, said: “Together with our top customer Vuma, we have launched the best technology available in the African market, which speaks volumes for the shared values of innovation and empowerment through connectivity that Huawei and Vuma share. Through this partnership, our goals are similar to those of Vuma: to support increased connectivity for all South Africans and bridge the gap in access to high-quality digital services.”
