Ericsson wins large fibre contract in India

Swedish equipment vendor Ericsson this week won a sizeable fibre to the home (FTTH) contract in a surprising market – India.

Under an agreement with local infrastructure provider and property management services firm Radius Infratel, which counts MTNL, BSNL and Airtel among its customers, Ericsson is to provide 600,000 households and businesses with fibre connectivity.

In the flourishing Indian market, where mobile growth is exploding, broadband adoption is climbing at a slower rate, with figures from Informa TM showing that broadband subscribers in the country rose from 8.7 million in the fourth quarter of 2009 to 9.6 million in the first quarter of 2010, up from 6.7 million in the same period in 2009.

Ericsson first struck a deal with Radius in 2009, when it started connecting Indian homes with its EDA 1500 GPON (Gigabit-capable Passive Optical Networks) system and passive fibre platform, providing in building services such as parking management, access control, automated lighting, and security services, through a single integrated infrastructure alongside broadband internet access and IPTV. The infrastructure is open and shared so service providers can easily deliver different services and customers can select the providers that best suit their needs.

Gowton Achaibar, head of India at Ericsson, said: “This agreement confirms the great potential for GPON / FTTx technology in India. We expect that by 2015 more than two million Indian homes and businesses will be connected to high speed broadband using GPON technology.”