Expo Workshop Previews

By Monta Monaco Hernon

As noted in Tuesday's previews, Expo's workshops are right at the annual confab's technical core. The variety and depth of information to be gained in one venue is unique in the industry. Here are a few more previews to help you plan for the show.

Delivering on the Promise of Business Services

Chris Gugger, senior director, market development, Cedar Point Communications, will review the reasons why cable operators should deliver services to the small-to-medium business market and the various solutions they can offer, including business trunking, direct business lines, hosted services, and portal services.

Andrew B. Sachs, director, strategic marketing, JDSU, calls cellular backhaul service "the critical Ethernet service." During his talk, he will discuss why Ethernet wireless backhaul is a question of "if" not "when."

Following the Rainbow to the Pot of Gold: Optimizing Implementation of Lightwave Multiplexing

Shawn M. Esser, senior product manager, Motorola, will detail how WDM, CWDM, and DWDM optical solutions can be instrumental to cable operators seeking to enter the commercial market and also to provide advanced services to existing customers using segmentation.

Timothy J. Brophy, director, network architectures, Cisco Systems, will look at how to choose a WDM system (classified according to number and spacing of wavelengths) based on an operator's existing network and "topological and product conditions."

Proactive Network Maintenance Using DOCSIS Pre-equalization

L. Alberto Campos, principal architect, broadband technologies, CableLabs, will detail how operators can leverage monitoring tools in DOCSIS devices to devise a proactive network maintenance plan. He will present a methodology that uses micro-reflection analysis, in part, to "pinpoint" a problem.

Revenue Assurance: Protecting Cable Networks Against Current and Next-Generation Fraud

Dan Rice, vice president, technology strategy, advanced technology and services group, ARRIS, says that focusing on revenue assurance (RA) can help operators improve "financial and operational metrics." He will provide suggestions about how to expose revenue leakage, cost leakage, and fraud and to use the OSS as part of RA.

It's Prime Time - Do You Know Where Your Network Is?

Carl Bolin, senior regional technical operations manager, Bright House Networks, will demonstrate how the OSS is being used to direct the "right information to the right people," in order to improve service and network reliability.

Robert F. Cruickshank III, vice president, operations and business support strategies, ARRIS, will show how electronic mapping can be used by capacity planning engineers, field technicians and fix agents, dispatchers, customer care representatives, and NOC personnel to develop a proactive strategy.

Click here for the full Expo workshop schedule.

- Monta Monaco Hernon

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