Alcatel-Lucent and Chunghwa Telecom launch world's first commercial deployment of G.fast ultra-broadband access technology in Taiwan

Tens of thousands of homes to benefit from innovation which combines fiber and copper technologies to meet demand for high-speed access quickly and cost-efficiently

Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU) and Chunghwa Telecom, Taiwan's leading service provider, are to commence the world's first commercial deployment of G.fast ultra-broadband access technology, allowing the acceleration of 'last mile' connectivity to deliver ultra-fast fiber-like speeds to households everywhere.

Currently 68% of homes in Taiwan enjoy broadband cable for Internet access. However, with growing demand for 4K TV and streaming HD video services, the need for ultra-broadband access is steadily increasing. To address this need, Chunghwa Telecom is conducting a nationwide roll-out of FTTx (fiber-to-the-premises) infrastructure to residential and business customers using a combination of fiber and copper technology. To accelerate these deployments and enable the delivery of near-gigabit speeds, Chungwa Telecom will deploy Alcatel-Lucent's GPON and G.fast technologies.

Alcatel-Lucent and its Bell Labs research arm have played a pioneering role in the development and implementation of G.fast, which has already been in trials with more than 30 operators worldwide. G.fast, in particular, allows service providers to provide ultra-broadband access to locations where fiber deployment is difficult, using the final length of copper infrastructure extending into premises to deliver ultra-high speeds. Additionally, G.fast eliminates the need to rewire entire buildings and homes, the most costly and time consuming part of any FTTx deployment.

The combination of fiber and G.fast will enable Chunghwa Telecom to quickly provide fast broadband to tens of thousands of homes in Taiwan within two years, and also meet the country's National Communications Commission plan to improve fixed broadband access in hard-to-reach residential locations. Chunghwa Telecom will launch ultra-broadband services using G.fast to the 8.4 million Taiwanese homes, low- and high-rise buildings in the fourth quarter of 2015.

Chunghwa Telecom will use Alcatel-Lucent's G.fast technology including:

• 7368 Intelligent Service Access Manager (ISAM) Optical Network Terminals (ONTs)
• 7368 Intelligent Services Access Manager (ISAM) CPE with integrated reverse power
• 5520 Access Management System to accelerate last mile fiber-to-the-home ultra-broadband connectivity while taking advantage of reduced costs and complexity.
• Chunghwa Telecom is currently deploying Alcatel-Lucent's 7342 Intelligent ISAM and 7360 ISAM GPON products.

Alcatel-Lucent's G.fast technology brings the speed of fiber to copper telephone lines allowing service providers to deliver ultra-broadband services to every user quickly and cost-effectively. With G.fast, service providers can overcome deployment obstacles with a mix of copper and fiber technologies.

Mu-Piao Shih, President of Chunghwa Telecom said: "We have made great strides in proactively improving our broadband network service in recent years, and we are pleased to become the first G.fast commercial broadband service provider in the world. With Alcatel-Lucent's G.fast technology we will be well equipped to launch a ultra high-speed network service toward the end of this year and offer our customers the highest broadband service experience, thereby solidifying our leadership in the fiber optics broadband service market ranging from 100Mbps to 1Gbps."

Ken Wu, President and Managing Director of Alcatel-Lucent Taiwan said: "As innovators in ultra-broadband fixed access, Alcatel-Lucent was the first company to bring G.fast to the market. For the past year we have been working with leading operators around the world to trial the technology.

"At the end of last year, Bell Labs, the research arm of Alcatel-Lucent launched the technology to upgrade the transmission speed of traditional copper telephone lines to 10Gbps. This year, the Taiwanese market has already rapidly introduced the latest technology and launched commercial services ahead of other markets to enable the consumers in Taiwan to experience CHT's G.Fast ultra-high-speed broadband service. Today we are happy to see Chunghwa Telecom take a pioneering role and become the world's first operator to deploy it commercially. By adding our G.fast technology to its portfolio, Chunghwa Telecom can better meet the demands of any deployment scenario to quickly and cost-effectively connect customers with the highest speeds in a highly competitive market."

About Alcatel-Lucent (Euronext Paris and NYSE: ALU)
Alcatel-Lucent is the leading IP networking, ultra-broadband access and cloud technology specialist. We are dedicated to making global communications more innovative, sustainable and accessible for people, businesses and governments worldwide. Our mission is to invent and deliver trusted networks to help our customers unleash their value. Every success has its network.

SOURCE Alcatel-Lucent