Swisscom Picks Huawei for Fiber Expansion

SHENZHEN, China -- Swisscom will provide 80 percent of all the households in Switzerland with ultra-high-speed Internet access by no later than 2020. While fibre-optic cables are being rolled out directly to homes and businesses in many towns and larger municipalities, Swisscom is focusing on Fibre to the Street (FTTS) in areas away from major urban centres. Swisscom has now selected Huawei as its strategic partner and supplier for its FTTS expansion. From the end of 2013, Swisscom will offer not only Fibre to the Home (FTTH) but also ultra-fast Internet and multimedia services, even in areas which will not be connected to FTTH in the coming years. To this end, Swisscom is laying fibre-optic cabling to within about 200 metres from buildings (Fibre to the Street, FTTS) and using the existing copper cables to cover the remaining distance. FTTS enables bandwidths of up to 100 megabits per second. In the next three to four years, bandwidths of 400 megabits per second or more will become possible. Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd.