Expanding on its two-year lead in the GPON marketplace, FTTP forerunner Optical Solutions Inc announced another industry milestone: its 30th IPTV customer, Pioneer Telephone Cooperative of Oklahoma. Pioneer is the nation's third largest telephone cooperative, with more than 140,000 customers/members in 72 exchanges and 30 Oklahoma counties.

According to independent sources, Optical Solutions' experience in PON-based IPTV is unrivaled in the industry. The FiberPath(R) GPON system is used in 90 percent or more of the nation's active, revenue-producing IPTV over PON deployments today. The FiberPath platform is also the leading FTTP access system in the United States -- accounting for 51 percent of the FTTH Communities identified in the FTTH Council report released last month.

"Nearly a decade ago we determined FTTH was the future of telecom; two years ago we launched the industry's first residential GPON system; and today we're ahead of the curve on IPTV," said Optical Solutions President and CEO Mike Dagenais. "Our company made a commitment to fiber optics from day one -- and that singular vision and hard-earned expertise have fueled our innovation, customer success and market leadership."

At SUPERCOMM 2005, Optical Solutions will demonstrate its proven High Definition (HD) IPTV service over GPON at the ITU Pavilion (Booth 73089). The "Reality TV" demo will also bring to light several real-world telco IPTV deployment challenges that are having a significant impact on QoS, content security, channel response time, OAM&P, and more.

The FiberPath IPTV Advantage
Optical Solutions' FiberPath 500 system is specifically engineered to deliver IPTV and other IP-based services as part of a complete triple-play service platform. The FiberPath system's IP-centric, Layer-3 architecture effectively solves service delivery issues ignored by Layer-2 based systems. The built-in intelligence of Layer-3 architecture also provides key advantages for telcos, including:

• DHCP security... protects video content by ensuring subscriber authenticity and eliminating STB spoofing.
• Integrated Quality of Service (QoS)... delivers superlative, crystal clear voice and video and is inherently more cost-efficient than Layer-2 VLAN-based QoS.
• True IGMP (vs. Layer-2 "snooping")... provides quick channel change response vs. video delivery delays.
• Superior OAM&P... provides user-friendly, turn-key customer service management that saves time and labor over Layer-2 VLAN-based management.
• Field-proven vendor interoperability... enables telcos to get their IPTV services turned up and producing revenue vs. facing costly delays with unproven demo systems.