Welcome to this dark fiber week in review. As always, the sector was extremely busy this week, so let's get right to it!

First, Cogeco Cable completed its acquisition of Atlantic Broadband from ABRY Partners. Formed in 2003, Atlantic Broadband stands as the 12th-largest cable television system operator in the U.S. As such, Cogeco Cable is now serving more than 2.45 million primary service units throughout North America.

"This is a very important day for Cogeco Cable as this acquisition marks our entry into the United States market. There are sizable opportunities for growth, including increasing the penetration of the small and mid-sized business segment and maximizing the bundling potential of services in the residential sector,” said Louis Audet, president and CEO at Cogeco Cable.

Next, Fibertech Networks plans to build new metropolitan fiber networks in Akron, Cincinnati, as well as Cleveland, Dayton and Toledo, OH, while enhancing its current Columbus network. The company's "open access" networks in important metropolitan areas have served as an important differentiator.

Because its offerings are all based on infrastructure completely owned and administered by Fibertech, the company offers unprecedented control, scalability and security in its services. Most importantly, it is able to scale out its network cheaply and quickly.

Dell'Oro Group this week released its Quarterly Access Report for Q3 2012, which states that the access gear market saw modest growth during the period. In total, the market's growth was up 6 percent compared to the same period in 2011.

Passive optical networking grew the most at 21 percent, while cable increased revenue by 5 percent. The DSL market saw a general upward trend thanks to VDSL growth of over 30 percent, offsetting weak ADSL figures.

In other news, Optical Communications Group made its fully fiber optic network available to support voice and data services in lower Manhattan. The network is supported by salt water-resistant fiber optic cables, as salt water destroyed a large portion of copper cables in downtown Manhattan during Hurricane Sandy.

OCG hopes to tempt customers waiting for their old copper-based services to be restored with a superior fiber offering. The company knows just how long repairing those copper lines could take, too, as its own copper cables were damaged during the storm.

Lastly, Bell Aliant selected NetCracker Technology's BSS/OSS solutions to go live with an expansion of its FibreOP offering. FibreOP offers high-speed Internet access and IPTV (News - Alert) with a variety of plans made available to customers.

NetCracker's BSS/OSS solution adds CRM, a CSR desktop, customer information management, end-to-end order management, trouble ticketing, service provisioning, service inventory, workforce management and resource management. As such, Bell Aliant (News - Alert) should have a much easier time managing FibreOP going forward.

That wraps up this week in review. Be sure to check out the Dark Fiber Channel for more news in this sector.

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