Harmonic Releases New Outdoor Hub Platform

Harmonic (News - Alert) Inc, a premier provider of infrastructure that powers the video economy, has recently introduced its new Outdoor Hub platform.

Cable operators, with the help of this new Outdoor Hub platform, will be enabled to extend their existing HFC network without the expense and time delay associated with building facilities to house new hub functions.

The Outdoor Hub, when combined with Harmonic's SUPRALink1550 nm transmission solution, will simplify architecture and streamline day-to-day operations, reducing capital and operating expenses.

Acting as an optical distribution point for downstream traffic and an aggregation point for upstream traffic, the Outdoor Hub will enable cable operators to push their fiber networks far beyond the traditional hub/headend infrastructure.

With the highly efficient fiber use enabled by the Outdoor Hub, operators will be able to deliver improved high speed internet, cable IPTV (News - Alert) and multiscreen services over their existing networks.

"In the past, cable service providers have constructed new buildings or climate-controlled vaults to house similar optical network functions. Such practices are expensive and delay service activation, due to the need for obtaining building permits," said Gil Katz, vice president, cable solutions at Harmonic, in a release. "With the Outdoor Hub, operators now have the option of using a node enclosure to grow their networks, thereby minimizing capital expenditure and speeding up service delivery."

The flexibility to be configured for a variety of functions is possessed by Outdoor Hubs. Each hub can house modules for optical switching, splitting, amplification, wavelength multiplexing and de-multiplexing, and re-lasing. These modules help operators to easily expand their existing nodes to Outdoor Hubs, which can then serve additional nodes.

In related news, Harmonic, a provider of video infrastructure solutions has launched its ProMedia Capture video ingest engine.