Fiber to the Premises (FTTP)

The way people live, work and play has greatly changed over the last decade. Our lives now incorporate learning from home, telecommuting, holding virtual appointments with healthcare providers, and visiting online with friends and family. We are dependent on high-speed broadband to make this possible.

Fiber to the premises (FTTP) refers to all-fiber networks that deliver high-speed broadband directly to homes, businesses and apartments. The use of fiber optic products dramatically increases connection speeds and reliability while improving network performance and minimizing cost to build FTTP networks.

Fiber is the new standard in supporting more devices deeper and further into networks than ever before. This enables high-speed connectivity to improve how communities live, work and play. Explore the various types of “premises” that fiber networks support.

Community
Broadband can deliver immeasurable benefits, including a path to the digital future to ensure your community's place in the innovation economy. And optical fiber – just like roads and waterways – is a key tool for economic development.

Curb
Fiber to the curb (FTTC) often refers to telecom architectures supporting xDSL technologies. Not fully passive, optical fiber reaches deep into the distribution of the network but leverages existing twisted pair copper cabling to support the final drop to subscriber active electronics.

Node
Fiber to the node (FTTN) often refers to cable operators’ hybrid fiber coax (HFC) networks supporting DOCSIS protocol. Fiber feeds powered optical-to-electrical (O/E) nodes in the access distribution that converts signal to run over existing coax cabling to subscribers. In fiber deep applications, amplifier cascades are reduced to improve overall bandwidth and performance.

Small Cell
As wireless demands have risen, fiber-fed macro tower base stations evolved into fiber to the antenna (FTTA) reaching up the tower to the radio heads themselves. As 4G/5G proliferates, operators will rely heavily on a wider mesh of small cells to provide the enhanced mobile broadband experience to end users. The preferred medium will be fiber… densification becomes “glassification” in fiber to the small cell (FTTSC) deployments.

Unit
Fiber to the unit (FTTU) often refers to the living unit, often characterized by being in a multidwelling unit (MDU) ranging from high rises, condos, or multiuse properties.