Cable Operators, Vendors Gear Up for CCAP Trials and Rollouts
Cable operators are preparing to test and deploy the industry’s next-generation access architecture, as their technology vendors start to churn out the necessary equipment for the converged cable access platform (CCAP). In recent interviews and webinars, cable executives said they're getting ready to try out CCAP technology in labs and in small field trials. Others said they've already started testing the new advanced technology for broadband and video service delivery, targeting commercial deployments by the end of this year or the beginning of next. Tech vendors are producing new CCAP equipment, and plan to demonstrate their gear at the Society of Cable Telecommunications Engineers show in Orlando, Fla., next month.
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Industry experts say cable’s embrace of CCAP is significant because the technology is designed to accelerate the industry’s move towards an all-Internet Protocol infrastructure. The specifications call for combining the functions of the now-separate cable modem termination system (CMTS) and edge QAM (quadrature amplitude modulation) devices in one super-dense platform, enabling cable providers to mix and match heavy loads of DOCSIS IP and QAM video traffic much more freely and easily. Proponents contend the technology will slash space and power requirements and operational costs in cable headends and speed up the rollout of IP video. They argue that CCAP will accelerate deployment of new cable services, such as network-based DVRs.
Comcast aims to start some small CCAP deployments in 2012, said Jorge Salinger, vice president of access architecture. The cable company is nearing the end of a CCAP operational readiness trial covering a “handful of service groups” in eight fiber nodes, a large enough sampling to draw some lessons, he said. “We hope to begin small-scale deployments later this year, if the equipment is available.” The trial is slated to end by early fall, Salinger said. “Then we'll ramp up starting next year. The implementation will take some time."
Comcast issued a CCAP request for proposals (RFP) to equipment vendors earlier this year (CD April 17 p5) . The company hasn’t announced any vendor choices. Declining to comment on the RFP results, Salinger said Comcast is now using its “equipment at hand” -- modular CMTS and edge QAM devices -- for the operational trial in an undisclosed market. He emphasized that Comcast isn’t actually “testing the platform itself” right now. Salinger said he expects CCAP equipment to be ready for the cable operator’s deployments.
Other major North American and European cable providers are getting ready for CCAP. Time Warner Cable and Cox Communications executives have talked about upgrading their networks for the new access architecture. Cox officials said they're now evaluating deployment options and developing their labs to support testing, once the equipment becomes available. In Europe, equipment vendors expect Virgin Media, Kabel Deutschland and Ziggo to issue CCAP requests for information to vendors this fall. Cable operators and vendors are looking for a wave of CCAP trials and initial commercial deployments in 2013.
Cable vendors say they'll be ready. Arris, Cisco and Google’s Motorola Mobility have announced plans to develop products for CCAP. Casa Systems, CommScope and Harmonic have either introduced gear or plan to do so at the SCTE show, expanding the number of known CCAP players to six. Several other CMTS, edge QAM and other vendors have been exploring the market as well. How many of these vendors will survive in the emerging CCAP market is another story. “Two to three players in the full CCAP space is about all the market can bear,” said Jeff Heynen, Infonetics Research analyst.
Some vendors plan to take different routes. Casa’s pursuing an integrated CCAP chassis combining the CMTS and edge QAM devices in one box, while CommScope is developing a “non-routing” CCAP for cable systems with a modular CMTS architecture using the core CMTS device for upstream signals and the edge QAM device for the downstream path. Shane Eleniak, vice president at CommScope, said on a Light Reading-sponsored webinar this month that a modular CCAP approach could help cable operators manage video and data services on the same platform. It would also preserve their existing architecture and set them up for a more integrated CCAP platform eventually, he said.
Cable operators might be better off going with an integrated CCAP from the start, Mark Sumner, Casa vice president, said on the webinar. An integrated architecture would be easier to manage and operate than a modular one, partly because the former is less complex and relies on fewer devices, he said. Sumner conceded that some cable providers that deployed modular CMTSs will likely wait before moving ahead to a fully integrated CCAP platform. “Neither one is a wrong answer,” he said. “It depends on what your architecture is today."
Noting Comcast has some modular CMTSs deployed, Salinger said the company isn’t going to replace them right away. He said Comcast will start deploying CCAP gear in cable systems with the greatest capacity needs first, recycling the existing CMTS and edge QAM devices by installing them in other, smaller markets. Comcast has learned it must consolidate network monitoring efforts as it makes the big shift to CCAP, Salinger said. Although cable systems now use different tools and alarms for different types of services, and generally manage them with different operations teams, he said Comcast plans to realign these operations for CCAP so that one group leads the entire coordinated effort.