Alcatel-Lucent will supply the network equipment to Telkom South Africa Telkom SA, one of the largest integrated communications companies in Africa, to dramatically expand the availability of superfast broadband services to subscribers throughout South Africa.

The project which is part of Telkom’s strategic ‘Network Transformation Initiative  includes upgrading the existing access network with new generation VDSL2 technology serving 4.4 million subscribers, and where commercially viable will also include the introduction of gigabit passive optical network (GPON) technologies to support fibre to the home (FTTH) capabilities. These new technologies will be key enablers for potential future services such as Video on Demand, IPTV, and high quality voice services.

Today, new applications are dramatically increasing capacity demands on communications networks. Alcatel-Lucent’s state of the art portfolio of fibre optic and copper based access technologies will help Telkom SA connect their customers in the fastest and most cost effective way. Alcatel-Lucent is providing Telkom SA with its industry leading Intelligent Services Access Manager (ISAM) product family, which supports passive optical networking (PON) and digital subscriber line (DSL) technologies on the same platform.

Daniel Jaeger, Alcatel-Lucent Vice President for Africa said “Our equipment will facilitate Telkom SA’s drive to more effectively compete with mobile service providers by delivering a better customer experience.”

With Alcatel-Lucent’s ISAM product family, Telkom SA can support a mix of fibre to the home (FTTH), fiber to the node (FTTN) and fibre to the building (FTTB) deployment models, giving them enormous flexibility to choose the quickest, most cost effective way to meet subscribers’ broadband needs. The ISAM family is a cornerstone of Alcatel-Lucent’s High Leverage NetworkTM architecture.