One of Shadow Foundr’s current campaigns, Genesis Technical Systems, is pleased to announce that CenturyLink’s residential broadband trial of Genesis’ DSL Rings system which took place in Monroe, Louisiana over the last three months has concluded successfully. The results exceeded expectations and the trial was deemed successful by both CenturyLink and Genesis. The trial highlights include:
- The successful operation of DSL Rings over CenturyLink’s access network infrastructure
Critical for future deployment of DSL Rings, this result also highlighted the DSLAM agnostic features of Genesis’ Convergence Node. This was the first time specific CenturyLink network infrastructure was utilised as a part of the trial. - Each of eight homes being able to burst to over the required phase II target for Connect America Funding (CAF) II of 25 Mb/s downstream and 3 Mb/s upstream.
This achievement was the primary objective of the trial. Phase I of a CAF II deployment is to realise 10 Mb/s downstream and 1 Mb/s upstream for rural homes. Although carriers are not legally obligated to provide additional phase II bandwidth targets, they are looking to engage suppliers who can achieve both phase I and II targets now to minimise future technology deployment disruption and protect their return on investments. - DSL Rings delivering backhaul bandwidth of approximately 750 Mb/s over a 1,000 ft distance between the Genesis Convergence Node and the Telco’s Central Office
By comparison a competing product using SHDSL over 1,000 ft would only deliver 80 Mb/s downstream. This product was the best available alternative solution that CenturyLink were considering before trialling DSL Rings. - Successful reliability testing
The DSL Rings equipment was soak tested over 3 months with zero downtime and performed with no detectable errors. This was another critical CenturyLink test requirement. Minimising maintenance and support of the equipment is crucial for Cost of Ownership calculations. - The ability to provision and de-provision homes that were on the ring without service impact to neighbouring homes
This supports Genesis’ pay-as-you-grow model, allowing CenturyLink to deploy the Genesis technology as and when customers are willing to take up service, rather than having to heavily invest in capital assets with the anticipation of future service take-up. - Minimal power outage impact
CenturyLink tested for power outages and their impact on homes on the DSL ring. Where power outages occurred in the home there was no impact on vital services across the rest of the ring, including Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS), which was maintained.
The types of services tested and validated included; rate vs. reach; multicast; dynamic bandwidth allocation, i.e., fairness; individual data burst transmissions, i.e. demonstrating that individual homes could get access to the full 400 Mb/s, and Plain Old Telephone Service (POTS).
CenturyLink is now in discussions with Genesis about the commercial business case and deployment integration of Genesis DSL Rings with CenturyLink’s existing operational and business support systems (OSS/BSS). In anticipation of a deployment at CenturyLink DSL Rings is currently undergoing full UL (Underwriters Laboratories) Certification.
Genesis expects initial CenturyLink orders in Q1 2019 in support of the first CenturyLink deployment in Q2 2019. Genesis has forecast that CenturyLink will deploy DSL Rings to 200,000 homes over the course of five years with the initial deployment being for 10,000 homes. This is a conservative estimate given that CenturyLink has identified between 1.5 and 2 million potential DSL Rings customers.
In summary, Genesis is pleased to complete this very important field trial. It is a major milestone for Genesis and another massive step forward towards first commercial deployment of DSL Rings.
Already backed by Harwell Capital and Midven, Genesis has given Shadow Foundr the opportunity for investors to fill the remaining £200k of their current £3m funding round.
The company is forecasting revenue of £7m next year, growing considerably as the take-up for its products gains traction, following this successful trial and further field trials taking place this year.
One of the major reasons for their bullish revenue forecasts, is because of the vast amounts of funding governments around the world are devoting to improving broadband performance in under-serviced areas. $20 Billion has been allocated in the US alone, through the Connect America Fund (CAF), which will ultimately be funnelled down to companies such as Genesis.
If you would like to learn more about Genesis or to invest in the company, please click here.
