Verizon Next Generation Broadband Strategy: We’ll Pass on G.fast and Stick With FTTP

Verizon’s Director of Network Planning Vincent O’Byrne outlined a Verizon next generation broadband strategy. That strategy is heavily focused on NG-PON2. It apparently will not include G.fast. “We have no strategy for G.Fast,” O’Byrne replied when I asked him why Verizon was not using G.fast for their multidwelling unit (MDU) deployments. O’Byrne stressed the goal of taking fiber all the way to the living unit, even in MDU environments. O’Byrne cited a variety of factors for passing on G.fast in favor of a true fiber-to-the-premises (FTTP) approach. Those reasons include poor copper network conditions across some of Verizon’s territory, as well as past copper broadband experiences in MDUs that Verizon does not want to repeat.

Verizon has been using VDSL and ethernet over copper to reach individual units in MDUs, when bringing fiber to its basement. They’ve run into considerable operational and interoperability challenges with this approach, O’Byrne noted. “We see ourselves in this same situation with G.fast five years from now,” O’Byrne explained.