In Case You Missed the 2009 FTTH Conference & Expo in Houston....
Nearly 1,800 leaders and professionals from all corners of the telecommunications industry converged on the Hilton-Americas Houston and the George R. Brown Convention Center in September for the 2009 FTTH Conference & Expo, where they saw the latest in all-fiber technology and heard about the business experiences of FTTH providers from across the continent and around the world.
Attendance numbers matched those of previous years, showing that the weakened global economy has not sidetracked the growing interest in upgrading copper-based networks to 100 percent fiber access. In more than 50 track sessions, panel discussions and workshops that took place during the four-day event, attendees learned about how all-fiber networks are changing the telecommunications landscape by delivering faster Internet connections and higher quality video services, and enabling service providers to "future-proof" their networks in light of the ever-expanding bandwidth requirements of their customers.
2009 Conference Highlights….
· Conference keynote speaker Richard Lynch, CTO of Verizon, rallied the attendees with a look back on the "naysayers" who initially dismissed his Verizon's bold investment in an FTTH strategy, and who he says now call the company asking for FiOS installation in their homes. See a video of Dick Lynch’s speech.
· During the week's activities, the FTTH Council announced that all-fiber networks now reach 5.33 million homes in North America, with 1.5 million households connected in each of the last two years. Read the press release.
· The Deputy Administrator of the Rural Utilities Service in the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Jessica Zufolo, provided an update on the broadband stimulus programs under the recovery legislation, while the conference also included numerous presentations and discussions on the progress of stimulus applications by FTTH companies.
· The conference included North America's largest trade show devoted to FTTH equipment, products and services. In addition to more than 130 exhibitors from the industry, the Expo Hall included demonstrations of fiber-powered HD and HD-3D television service, as well as a demonstration of a telemedicine application sponsored by MedConcierge and St. Joseph Medical Center in Houston.
· For the first time in its eight year history, the conference included presentations in Spanish and Portuguese covering issues specific to Latin America, and coinciding with the launch of the FTTH Council's new Latin America chapter.