PITTSBURGH -- Marconi (LONDON: MNI), a global provider of advanced communications solutions, today announced that it has reached a key milestone in optical access – deploying more than three million lines of fiber-to-the-curb capacity and extending the power of optics to homes across North America.

Fiber-to-the-curb solutions enable service providers to bundle affordable next-generation services to homeowners, including high-speed Internet access, telephony services, cable and direct broadcast satellite (DBS) television, video-on-demand and home security. Service providers who have installed fiber-to-the curb solutions are positioned to easily upgrade their networks as bandwidth demand increases, and even deploy fiber-to-the-home.

"Fiber-to-the-curb is really coming of age. Increasingly, both new andestablished service providers are finding this an exciting and affordablesolution -- for communities of any size," said Mike Pratt, executive vicepresident and general manager, Access Products Group, Marconi. "Marconi iseliminating the bottlenecks that prevent today's consumers from fullyleveraging the high-bandwidth applications that will change the way we alllive, work and play."

http://www.marconi.com