Challenge
Known as "the future of connectivity," FTTP (Fibre to the
Premises) technology sends signals from a broadcast
distributor or Internet service provider directly to the
home using fibre optic cable. It is considered a superior
technology because it uses light to carry Internet
transmissions and television signals at rates simply not
achievable through telephone wires.
One of the greatest obstacles to delivering FTTP
technology is that it can take years to install and be cost
prohibitive. In some cases, telecommunications providers
have spent $1,000 -$1,500 per subscriber to make the
service available. When Bell Aliant first began to roll out its
FibreOP service in 2009, the company was bound by time-
consuming data collection processes that required data to
pass through multiple entry points. By the time surveys were
completed and manual measurements were performed,
it could take five employees almost two weeks to prepare
field data for the verification stage.
With a goal to accelerate the roll out and cost-effectively
expand its FibreOP digital services over the next three
years, Bell Aliant quickly recognized a need to automate the
design and data collection process.
Using GIS, design times are reduced by
40% and data accuracy improved by 25%
Based in Atlantic Canada, Bell Aliant is the largest fibre optic service provider in the
country and plans to offer FibreOP technology to more than 650,000 customers by the
end of 2012. It was the first service provider in Canada to cover an entire city and offer
a 100% fibre optic network directly to customer's homes. Using GIS technology, the
company reduced design times by 40%, improved data accuracy by 25% and was able to
cover an additional 156,000 premises within the first six months of the rollout.
1 Esri Canada | Bell Aliant rolls out FibreOP technology in a fraction of the time using GIS
