Optical Solutions, Inc. has secured a contract with Buckland Telephone Company of Buckland, Ohio. Buckland is replacing its copper infrastructure with an advanced gigabit passive optical network that will feature IPTV as part of a triple-play service offering. The rural carrier selected Optical Solutions' leading FiberPath 500 GPON system to support its transition to IP-based services.

Century-old Buckland Telephone Company serves a six square-mile agricultural region approximately 60 miles north of Dayton. The carrier is among the first in the state to offer IPTV service.

"When you add up the 200 channels, video-on-demand and pay-per-view service in our IPTV package, along with direct-fiber data speeds up to 768 Mbps and multiple lines of voice service, we're giving customers a powerful argument for choosing Buckland for all their communication and entertainment needs," said Dave Simons, network administrator at Buckland. "Optical Solutions' GPON gave us the bandwidth we were looking for, and it has a proven track-record in the industry - especially for delivering IPTV."

Optical Solutions' FiberPath 500 system offers superior bandwidth -- 1.2 Gbps downstream and 622 Mbps upstream -- for delivering bandwidth-consuming services such as Internet Protocol TV (IPTV) and symmetrical high-speed data services. The FiberPath system is fully compliant with ITU FSAN standards, and is the only residential GPON platform that is widely deployed and available today.

"Independent carriers like Buckland that are looking to increase revenue from unregulated services have realized the advantages of migrating to an all-fiber, IP-based network now vs. later," said Mike Dagenais, president and CEO of Optical Solutions. "The FiberPath system gives telcos a solid platform for creating new revenue streams and securing their networks from predatory competition."