The Secret to Driving Your Commercial Business

Historically, cable companies have been occupied with providing services to residential customers. As this market becomes saturated, network operators are looking for new streams of revenue. At the same time, commercial and industrial businesses, as well as governmental agencies, have become in desperate need of advanced, reliable and secure connections that drive business their current slower type of communication connection can't provide.

It makes sense that cable operators move into providing these commercial businesses with service. The secret to providing this service, and make money doing so, relies on an operator’s ability to know the plant’s current location, balance investment cost and return and designing the most efficient way to get the network there.

Setting up a GIS system on the plant will provide operators the ability to do just this. A GIS system will allow cable companies to:

o    Document all existing fiber assets

o    Find the most efficient way to provide high-speed circuits to targeted commercial customers

o    Estimate cost for last-mile fiber

o    Provide a quick and economical proposal

The first step to getting a GIS solution may require an audit of the entire plant: outside and inside. All physical outside plant assets from the headend/ hub to the final destination are identified: fiber routing, splice enclosures, slack loops and riser locations. Also fiber counts and footage markers are gathered and documented.

An inside plant audit provides the key ingredient in completing a GIS database. The headend, hub or optical transport network site is defined.

When all the crucial plant asset information is documented and transferred into a GIS software system that fits the needs of the network, cable operators can use the functional system to accurately plan which commercial customers it would make sense economically to target.  Operators will have the network at their fingertips.  When working within the GIS environment, improved serviceability can be achieved: eliminating needless truck rolls, saving money and retaining records of service status.