Historically within the world of telecommunications, different technologies were delivered independently of each other. However, this is changing with the development of single solutions that encapsulate multiple technologies. In this piece, I explore some of the ways Technetix innovation brings together solutions that would ordinarily be categorized separately. 

Living legacy 

Connectivity is everywhere today. Whether it’s a private connection between two buildings, a multi-sited network, a home user online in a remote work environment – even your fridge notifying you that you’ve run out of milk. It all needs connectivity. Historically, these connections were supplied over coaxial or copper, but more recently, they’re delivered through overhead or underground  fiber connections.  

More experienced folks in the industry call a connection between two points a ‘bit of wet string’ and this methodology has served the industry well. It’s simple: a box at one end, a box at the other, with some type of cable and telecommunications technology to connect the two. But it is within this technology that the magic happens: that there’s enough bandwidth allocated to the correct connection, ensuring the traffic traverses to the correct destination, or using existing legacy technologies and stretching its capabilities beyond what was thought possible.   

Power to the people! 

With telecommunications infrastructure central to globally critical services, its development and evolution is crucial. In the UK, copper telephony lines are being replaced with other technologies, removing the benefits of its operator-supplied power that sustained continual live lines. New technology demands active in-home, locally powered equipment to ensure subscribers stay connected. While it’s no disaster that the fridge can’t replenish dwindling humous stocks, other services like alarms, doorbells, and medical monitoring are another matter. Keeping this vital infrastructure working is essential: imagine a situation where a consumer cannot call an emergency service.   

Given Technetix’ heritage in power-carrying Hybrid Fiber Coax (HFC) networks, it makes sense for us to use our experience and expertize to bring power into the world of fiber. Be it as a UPS power supply to ensure your systems and networks continue to run during a power outage, or a portable and powering solution that can be deployed quickly, we’ve developed powering for both HFC and fiber networks. Using lithium LiFEPO4 batteries, our solutions provide a clean and sustainable alternative to traditional portable fuel generators. These high-capacity batteries also allow us to provide battery backup solutions for network equipment, keeping essential equipment silently powered during power outages with, depending on load, up to 100-hour runtime.  

Software development and network management 

Being open with your management APIs is essential to a network operator: imagine managing all of your equipment via just one platform, regardless of the manufacturer. Not all manufacturers support this, possibly to lock operators into exclusivity with them. At Technetix, we believe in giving our customers the option to manage equipment through open-source APIs, which is why our devices are compatible with third party applications, not just our own. We believe open architecture is the innovative, sustainable approach to create solutions that meet our customers’ requirements. We work closely with other manufacturers to integrate our solutions, like our rOLT (remote optical line terminal), which can be configured using the Nokia Altiplano software. This eliminates the need for multiple provisioning applications. 

AI-empowered networks 

While machine learning (ML) gathers historical datasets to predict the probability of events, artificial intelligence (AI) presents human-like decision-making capabilities. Both AI and ML are set to play a pivotal role in the future of… 

Network design and planning: Networks will be sized and designed using AI and ML to create network solutions to meet the pre-determined requirements, amplification tuning within HFC, or planning a backbone network. 

Troubleshooting: By using and analyzing historical data, data traffic forecasts, predictions and failure rates, AI and ML will help with network troubleshooting, and predict when failures will occur. 

Network optimization: Networks will self-optimize based on historical data and data traffic patterns. 

At Technetix we thrive on providing innovative solutions to our partners and customers, and our pedigree in innovation puts us in place to help the telecommunications industry evolve and converge technologies into one solution. For more information on how we’re leading the way with unified solution innovation, get in touch.

Author – Nick O’Hara, Sales Engineering Director

Nick O’Hara is Technetix’ Sales Engineering Director, and a self-confessed ‘geek’. He started out in the telecommunications industry in 1991 as a radio technician and since then, has always been involved in networking technologies. Taking great delight in fixing problems, Nick’s engineering experience provides him with a valuable lens to examine customer needs, identifying the very best solutions for their requirements.