Space Management Part I

1
Space Management Part I

• Customer solutions, space allocation and funder
  priority

2
Key Points

• Our cabinets and other options are sufficient to
  cover most conceivable scenarios
• Overly prescriptive space management rules will
  create gold-plated, complex processes and drive
  costs
• Each of our customers has equipment and needs
  that are specific to them
• The business case is challenging the party
  funding the cabinet should have confidence that
  they can utilise the space required for their
  business case

3
Chorus cabinets

• Chorus Distribution Cabinets include
• Single bay Whisper cabinets
• Double bay Whisper cabinets
• USC cabinets
• Other legacy cabinets
• Radio huts, converted water tanks, etc.
• This presentation focuses primarily on the
  Whisper cabinets, which we think are of most
  interest to our customers.
• The Sub-loop STD will apply to all types of
  Distribution Cabinets.

4
Distribution Cabinets and the FTTN Programme

• Distribution Cabinet areas for the FTTN Programme
  are designed
• (a) to ensure sub-loops have a maximum line loss
  of 60dB measured at 1024 Mhz. Practically, this
  means sub-loops have a maximum length of 2.4 kms
  in urban-type areas
• (b) this is checked against a target maximum of
  330 workers per area and an absolute maximum of
  384 workers (so as not to exceed the capacity of
  the Telecom Wholesale Alcatel-Lucent 7302 ISAM)
• (c) in practice, engineering for (a) generally
  ensures (b), but in a few cases the design will
  need to be modified to reflect (b)
• (d) the cabinets are designed to minimise
  physical impact on the environment.

5
Single bay Whisper cabinet

• The single bay whisper cabinet has 27 Rack Units
  in the equipment bay
• a single bay is designed to be used when the
  copper feeder is available and POTS services are
  provided using equipment in the Exchange
• half a Rack Unit is required at the bottom for
  the fibre tray
• the cabinet configuration requires 2 Rack Units
  of free space at the top of the bay for cooling
• space may also be required between equipment for
  cooling.

6
Double bay Whisper cabinet

• The double bay whisper cabinet has 27 Rack Units
  in each of its two equipment bays
• a double bay is designed to be used when the
  copper feeder is no longer available in
  sufficient quantities to support all End Users
  with voice from the Exchange. Double bays cannot
  be used without voice equipment as the
  termination area is not able to support SLES
  terminations.
• the double bay has the same heat management
  capability as a single bay cabinet
• half a Rack Unit is required at the bottom for
  the fibre tray
• the cabinet configuration requires 2 Rack Units
  of space at the top of each bay for cooling
• space may also be required between equipment for
  cooling.

7
Covec and cost-benefit analysis

• Covec suggests that the Commission should conduct
  a cost-benefit analysis of additional cabinet
  space and the competitive benefits it
  facilitates.
• Clearly a build obligation that transfers our
  customers business risk onto us will encourage
  high risk/high return behaviour which will not be
  to the long term benefit of end users.
• If the Commission wished to take Covecs advice
  and perform a cost-benefit analysis of the
  long-term interests of end-users it would need to
  do so properly (and it would need to make
  predictions of future competitive market
  structures which Covec disapproves of).
• We suggest that working through facts and
  realistic assumptions (rather than a cost-benefit
  analysis) will bring us to a better conclusion,
  more quickly and with less speculation on future
  competitive structures.

8
Realistic assumptions

• Some realistic assumptions on co-location in our
  cabinets are
• Telecom Wholesale will be present (at least
  initially) in all our cabinets
• our customers will install equipment where they
  have either
• (a) a significant market share or an intention to
  gain a significant market share or
• (b) one or more high value customers off that
  cabinet
• in scenario (a), our customer will employ a
  (potentially localised) mass marketing strategy
  and use DSLAM equipment that supports a
  significant number of workers and
• in most cases there will only be 2 mass market
  providers with installed equipment
• in the exceptions, our customers can build (or
  contract us to build) additional capacity as
  easily as we can
• in scenario (b), our customer will employ smaller
  equipment to offer higher value, specialised
  services
• in scenario (b) the end users are likely to have
  contracted with the service provider for an
  extended period or on special terms that make a
  wider range of co-location options, such as a
  pedestal, box on a pole, etc, feasible.

9
Customer solutions and funder priority

• The Whisper cabinets have enough space for more
  than one set of equipment, but there will always
  be exceptional circumstances, specialised
  business cases that require additional space, and
  the existence of non-Whisper cabinets
• Chorus is in the business of providing
  co-location space and well work with our
  customers to develop solutions for their space
  needs
• The funder priority rule agreed by the TCF was
  designed to provide some confidence to those
  investing in cabinets that they would get the
  benefit of solutions created for them