The Ethernet exchange movement continues to gain converts. Today Intellifiber announced that it has joined CENX with an initial connection in New York. Intellifiber has about just over 1000 on-net buildings, but the company brings some 100K buildings to the table which it can address with Ethernet-over-copper (EoC) technology. Most of those are in the mid-Atlantic region where their footprint is deepest, especially when it comes to on-net central offices.
I tend toward fiber myself of course, but I wonder if this could be the tipping point for EoC. Thus far it has made only a small impression on the market overall, although many of its adherents swear by it. Perhaps a big part of the reason why has been the lack of interconnectivity with other islands of Ethernet access, for which a solution may now be at hand.
CENX crossed the milestone of 10M addressable locations earlier this month, but that is potential rather than actual value. Lots of companies hoping to sell access to their footprints, but is anybody buying? Actually it does now look as if the next phase is beginning, as there is now a faint but audible buzz about connections being made and services sold. Anyone have direct experience?
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Categories: Ethernet · Metro fiber
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Good point, Rob, concerning EoC. Long before there were neutral Ethernet exchanges of the types we’ve been discussing here, I recall being asked about such exchange-based solutions by SMBs and larger enterprises that had branch offices who found themselves stymied for lack of a way to interconnect smaller denomination services that some marketing types have classified as “mid-band Ethernet”. In some large buildings numerous providers are making their copper-based Ethernet services available at attractive price points, but they’re typically lacked the ability to interconnect with one another, relegating each of them to a state of one-off, sequestered by their very nature. Covad’s entry into this space by joining CENX should be telling to some degree in determining EoC’s ‘fitness’ for exchange traffic, IMO. You wrote about Covad’s entry in an earlier thread a couple months ago, here: http://bit.ly/bEhB0w
frank@fttx.org
My bad. I conflated the subject heading at http://bit.ly/bEhB0wwith what Covad actually announced. Rob, for posterity you may wish to delete this post that you are now reading and my reference to Covad in my previous post above, or else simply accept my mea culpas for flubbing the part I wrote about Covad above. Then again, you may simply want to leave it there, as is, and call me clairvoyant in the not too distant future 😉
Actually, you just got the link wrong, here are the right ones:
http://www.telecomramblings.com/2010/05/tuesday-roundup-covad-level-3-global-crossing/
http://www.telecomramblings.com/newswire/2010/05/covad-wholesale-partners-with-cenx-to-offer-carrier-ethernet-services/
Thanks for clearing that up.